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1 1 4..«,„«-M.i-...^ By EDGAR BRIGGS —«— — ♦ j| 



THE BRIGGS' SYSTEM 

FOURTH EDITION 

Including Also **Secrets in Poultry Culture'* 



HOSTERMAN PUBLISHING COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS. 

BINGHAMTON, N. V. SPRINGFIELD, OHIO. 




Class 
Book. 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



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PROFITS IN POULTRY 
KEEPING SOLVED 



TME BRIGGS' SYSTEM AND SECRETS OP 
SUCCESSFUL POULTRY RAISING 



An Economical, Labor Saving, Profit Assuring 
System of Poultry Raising 



BY 



EDGAR BRIGGS 



Edited and Revised by HENRY TRAFFORD. 
EDITOR POULTRY SUCCESS 



FOURTH EDITION 
1910 



HOSTERMAN PUBLISHING COMPANY, 

PUBLISHEKS 

SPRINGFIELD. OHIO 

BINGHAMTON, N. Y. 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



Portrait of Author, Edg-ar Briggs 4 

Home of Author and Experimental Plant 6 

General View Briggs' Poultry Plant . 8 

Sectional View Briggs' Poultry Plant . • 9 

The Briggs' Model Laying House 12 

Frame of Briggs' Model Laying and Brooder House 14 

Section of Nest Boxes 18 

Feed Hopper, End and General View 19 

Diagram of End of Laying House 20 

Section of Briggs' Poultry Farm, Arrangement, Etc 23 

Typical White Wyandotte Cock 24 

Series of Bins for Spouting Oats and Grain 27 

Prize Winning Barred Plymouth Rock Cock 30 

Pair Ideal Rose Comb Rhode Island Reds 32 

Prize Winning White Plymouth Kock Hen 34 

Prize Winning White Wyandotte Hen 36 

Pen of Single Comb White Leghorns 37 

Prize Winning White Orpington Cock 39 

Brooder Hover Complete 44 

One Half of Brooder from Center to Back 45 

Brooder complete except Hover 46 

Trio of Prize Winning White Leghorns 46 

Colony House Showing Portion of Brooder 47 

A Flock of Handsome Pekin Ducks 51 

Typical S. C. White Leghorn Cock 53 

A Pair of Winning Silver Laced Wyandottes 56 

A Turkey produced by the Briggs' System 59 

A Prize Winning Black Minorca Hen 64 

Typical Heads of Male and Female White Wyandottes 71 

A Famous Pen of White Wyandottes 77 

A High Class S. C. White Leghorn Cock 79 

A Barred Plymouth Rock Male, fine Shape and Barring 81 

A Barred Plymouth Rock Hen of Fine Type 83 

A Famous Pen of S. C. White Leghorns '. . . . . 85 

A Popular Member of the Wyandotte Family 87 

A Pen of Prize Winning Columbian Wyandottes 88 

A Trio of Noted S. C. White Leghorns 90 

A Well Bred S. C. White Leghorn Cock 92 



Copyriifhl l'>Ui by 
HOSTERMAN PUBLISHING CO. 



Firsl Edition Copyrigrht 1906. 
Second Edition Copyriffht 1907. 
Third Edition Copyrigrht 1908. 



CLA^iifiSia 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHAPTER I- Brigg^s' Poultry Plant 7 

CHAPTER II— How to Erect and Run a Poultry Plant ifor Profit 10 

CHAPTER III— Location of a Plant 11 

CHAPTER IV— Laying^ Out a Plant 12 

CHAPTER V — Specifications for the Model Laying- House 13 

CHAPTER VI— Directions for Constructing the Model Laying House 15 
CHAPTER VII -Making of Hoppers 21 

CHAPTER VIII— Care of Layers 92 

CHAPTER IX— An Egg Plant for Profit ". 25 

CHAPTER X— Processed Feeds and How to Produce Them 28 

CHAPTER XI— Summer Care 31 

CHAPTER XII- A Free Range Plant with Little Labor ' 33 

CHAPTER XIII— Caring for Yarded Plant 35 

CHAPTER XIV— How to Build an Ideal Incubator House 37 

CHAPTER XV— How to Run an Incubator ^8 

CHAPTER XVI— Chicks Raised Nature's Way 40 

CHAPTER XVII— A Perfect Brooder " 44 

CHAPTER XVIII— Raising Broilers— Bowel Trouble, It's Cause 

and Cure 4g 

CHAPTER XIX— Cold and Roup '..'....'.'.'.".'.'.'..'. 50 

CHAPTER XX— Caring for a Plant where Wheat or Screenings 

Cannot be Bought 51 

CHAPTER XXI— When and How to Start in Poultry Business 52 
CHAPTER XXII-A*Leghorn Plant for Profit.... " "54 
CHAPTER XXIII— A White Wyandotte Plant for Profit ' 57 
CHAPTER XXIV— A Combination Plant for Profit, Fruit, Poul- 
try and Bees 60- 

CHAPTER XXV— Loss of Breeders During Heavy Laying Season 61 

CHAPTER XXVI— Molting 62 

CHAPTER XXVII— Feeding and Selection of Large Breeds 

Important. ...... 63 

CHAPTER XXVIII— To Erect a Yarded Plant 65 

CHAPTER XXIX-Fireless Brooders, Trick of the Trade, etc. 67 

CHAPTER XXX— Duck Culture 68 

CHAPTER XXXI— Summary .'...'.'.'.'.'.'.'..'.'.'.'". .' 72 

Brigg's "Secrets in Poultry Culture" !..... 75 

Secrets of Success, Early Chicks 76 

Secret of Raising Late. Chicks 76 

" Large Egg Yield 78 

" Feeding Unthrashed Grain in Winter . . . 79 

" Getting Eggs Every Month 80 

" Curing White Diarrhoea 81 

'■ " Curing Gaps 82 

" Formula for Lice Powder " 82 

for Making Liquid Lice Killer . . . . . . . . 83 

'* of Raising Turkeys 84- 

" Dry Mash for Baby Chicks ...".'....".. 84 

" Dry Mash for Laying Fowls ' ' ' ' . 85 

" Egg Preserving Formula '.'............... 85 

" " Breeding for Layers 86 

" Telling the Laying Hen 89 

'' Fattening Poultry '.. . . . 89 

" Breaking up Brooding Hens 89 

" Molting Fowls Early ......... 90 

" Preparing White Birds for Exhibition ..'.'. 91 

" Feeding Salt 91 

Results 93 

Index of Subjects 94 ' 95 96, 




EDGAR BRIGGS 

Author of "Profits in Poultry Keeping Solved" and "Secrets in Poultry Culture' 



INTRODUCTORY 

In the way of introduction to those who have never 
heard of me or of my new methods, it is perhaps advisable 
that I should say something about myself. I was born a poul- 
tryman ; my father before me bred fancy stock all his life and 
from a small boy I gathered eggs, took charge of the poultry, 
exhibited them at the county fairs and had birds of my own. 
1 have bred fancy stock all my life and tried the winter broiler 
business with fatal results, as hundreds of others have 
done. This led me to experimenting and also studying nature's 
methods to see if there was not some way in which they could 
be raised on a large scale without such great loss. The result is, 
after fifteen years of careful experimenting, I have solved the 
problem and am now able to put any poultry plant on a pay- 
ing basis, regardless of location or other obstacles. Plants 
that went out of business on account of using the ordinary 
methods have started up under my new methods and have 
had wonderful success The first edition of my book which 
was put on the market five years ago has all been sold, as 
well as the second edition of 3,000 copies in 1907; and the 
third edition of 5,000 copies in 1908, and this fourth edition is 
now required. 

My great feed, for such it is, at 15 cents or less per bushel, 
will make any plant pay. After experimenting with processed 
oats, my main feed for 15 years, I consider I now have as 
near a perfect feeding system as can be obtained for either 
a yarded or free-range plant. Follow my methods and my in- 
structions as laid down in this book, and success is certain. 
Read every line carefully. You cannot go wrong. A for- 
tune awaits everyone who builds one of my free-range or 
yarded plants, as they are bound to pay a handsome profit un- 
der my system of care and feeding. 

Very truly yours, 

EDGAR P.RIGGS, 

Author. 
Dated September ist. 1909. 




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POULTRY RAISING 7 

CHAPTER I 

Briggs' Poultry FUifU 

The first edition of my book appeared in April, 1906; and 
a second edition of 3,000 copies in 1907, a third edition 
of 5,000 copies in 1908. I am now offering a fourth edition, 
as my main object is to get out a new edition every 
year so as to give the benefit of all my latest experiments. 
I bought two years ago a 60-acre farm specially adapted to 
building one of my free-range plants upon, where I can enter- 
tain my friends and where they will aways be welcome and 
made at home. I am now carrying on my plant 2,000 layers of 
the very choicest White Wyandottes and Single-Comb 
White Leghorns by my famous free-range system. No time 
nor expense will be spared in making this one of the greatest 
paying plants in this country. This will also be to some ex- 
tent an experimental farm, as my aim will be, if possible, to 
improve on my system. All my young stock will be raised 
on the free-range system as laid down in this book. For this 
I have two four-acre fields, side by side, which are inclosed 
by a wire netting fence, as described elsewhere, one field is 
used for White Wyandottes and one for Single-Comb 
White Leghorns. I expect to raise each season 2,000 of each 
breed. Four choice matings of each variety will be kept to 
produce prize winners and to produce males for breeders and 
for my customers, as my great aim is to produce the best 
hatching eggs in this country from the best stock at the low- 
est prices. Those who have bought my book, will get the 
benefit of all my experiments as well as the benefit of excep- 
tional quality in stock and eggs. 

In front of my dwelling I have a five-acre field with a 
fine stream of water running through it, one of the most 
natural locations to be found hereabout. I carry one thou- 
sand White Wyandotte layers of high quality in this field 
such as are seldom seen in such numbers together. I have 
another six-acre field on another part of my farm, where I 
carry one thousand Single-Comb White Leghorn layers, no 
finer nor greater layers can be found in this country. A large 
feed house is built on a side hill, and underneath it will be a 
large cellar divided up, one part for incubators, one part for 
an tgg room,, and one-half for processing oats. Labor is a 
small item on my plant, as all my feeding, etc., is done with 
the aid of a gentle horse. My first work after getting posses- 
sion of this farm, April i, 1908, was to build laying houses 



8 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

and to get my stock in their new quarters, when my colony 
houses, as described elsewhere, were built, and two brooders 
placed in each house; then a large number of fruit trees were 
put out for shade, as well as profit. Do not fail to pay me a 
visit if you come this way. My place is located three-quarters 
of a mile from Pleasant Valley depot, on the old P. E- R. R 
now owned by N. Y., N. H. & H. R. R. All trains from 
Poughkeepsie Bridge depot stop at Pleasant Valley. To 
reach my place from depot turn to left, walk to hotel past 
the front -ind turn to the left, walk north by the end of 
hotel and straight ahead until you reach my place — fifteen 
minutes walk from depot. If notified my wagon will meet you 
at depot. If you come to West Pleasant Valley station walk 
east five minutes and you will reach my place. If you come 
from the east through Boston you get off at same depot. 
You are always welcome any day except Sunday. 




GENERAL, VIEW OF BRIGGS' POULTRY PLANT 
Operated according to the system described in tliis book 



POULTRY RAISING 





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10 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER II 

How to Erect a?id Run a Poultry Plant for Profit 

I will now tell you how to erect and run a poultry plant 
en an entirely new system for saving labor and money making. 
A plant for the farmer, as much as the business man ; a plant 
that can be run by an amateur, so that without experience 
it can be rrade to pay a profit from the start. It is conceded 
by men who know, that ninety-five out of every one hundred 
who start make a failure in the poultry business. The reason 
for this is because they go entirely opposite to nature in car- 
ing for them. A hen in her wild state roosts in trees and feeds 
on seeds of various kinds, worms and insects of every descrip- 
tion, and when you shut her up in a yard you make a prison- 
er of her. Under these conditions she is fed on mashes of 
various kinds until she is sick and out of condition and the 
natural result or consequence is she does not lay more than ^ 
the tggs, she is capable of doing, in some cases not an egg. 
Hens kept under such conditions in many cases die of roup 
or cholera or other malignant diseases. 

Another very important thing we can learn from the hen 
in her wild state is that she always lays her brood of eggs 
during the spring time, hatches and raises her chicks when 
the ground gives up a crop of worms and various other in- 
sects, and by the time the chicks are fit to wean, dry weather 
of summer comes on and worms and insects become scarce 
and the result is the hen lays no more eggs during the year. 

Now, in order to keep hens laying the year round, we 
must produce spring time conditions the year round. And 
there is nothing that can take the place of insects equal to 
green cut bone but this is very hard to obtain in most places, 
and especially on a large scale, therefore, as a rule, we must 
use beef scraps in place of it. 



POULTRY RAISING ii 

CHAPTER III 
Location 

First of all we must have a suitable location. This is a 
very important thing if you are going in the poultry business 
for profit. If you do not own a farm and wish to buy one, by 
all means spend some time and get one suitable for the busi- 
ness. I advise not less than fifty to seventy-five acres. One 
with a nice, big orchard on it is most desirable. By all means 
get a place with one or more streams of water running 
through it, and if these streams are fed by springs so much 
the better. Under no circumstances buy a place for the poul- 
try business unless it is well watered, for this is where a 
great amount of labor saving comes in, moreover, the poultry 
will do much better — this is nature. 

Get a place, if possible, sloping to the south, with gravel- 
ly or sandy soil. Sixty acres will carry five thousand layers 
nicely and leave room enough to raise six thousand young- 
sters if it is laid out right, besides furnish pasture for your 
horses and cows, leaving room for garden and various other 
things you will want on a farm. An ideal poultry farm should 
be inclosed with a five-foot fence of wire netting and two barb 
wires over this. It should also have a base board of rough 
hemlock sunk two inches or more below the surface of the 
ground. This makes a plant practically proof against all 
kinds of animals, and there is nothing that has more enemies 
than chickens. This is all the fence you will need on your 
plant, as a rule, unless you go into fancy breeding or wish to 
divide your cockerels and pullets, in this case you should fence 
in the fields. Your hens must have free range if you want 
results and you should remember the profit lies in eggs. There- 
fore, an egg plant is what you must have to make money. 
A plant of this kind laid out right and handled properly can 
be run by the labor of one man most of the time, as under my 
system labor is reduced to the minimum. High cost of labor 
has put more poultry plants out of business than any other 
one thing. 



12 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 
CHAPTER IV 



Laying Out a Plant 

Build the laying houses on both sides of the stream of wa- 
ter far enough away to keep them on high ground. Put your 
houses 60 to 75 feet apart according to your ground, allowing 
from 60 to 75 Leghorns to a house ; or fifty Wyandottes, 
Rocks or the larger breeds. Colonize your flocks in this man- 
ner, then you will have no further trouble, as nearly every hen 
will go in her own house. 

To flock or colonize them, put your hens in the house and 
keep them shut up for three days, letting them out on the 
third day one hour before dark. Your hens get acquainted in 
the three days they are shut up together and will ever after 
that run together and return to their own house to lay and 
roost. After trying houses of various kinds and styles, I 
have never found one that suits me so well as the one illus- 
trated below and will later describe. I consider it the most 
perfect house built at the present time — and also the cheapest 
of construction. 




THE BRIGGS MODEL LAYING HOUSE 



POULTRY RAISING 13 

CHAPTER V 

Specijicatiojis for the Model Laying Rouse 

Following is a list of the lumber that is required to build 
a house, such as is referred to in the preceding chapter : 

Three chestnut planks, 2 by 8 by 20 feet long. 

Thirty-three boards, i by 8 by 16 feet long, tongued and 
grooved. 

Thirty-three boards, i by 8 by 14 feet long, tongued and 
grooved. 

Twelve hemlock, 2 by 4 by 20 feet long. 

Five 2 by 3, ten feet long, for roosts. 

Three windows, one 8 by 10 glass, six panes each and 2 
canvas covered frames. 

This house is ten feet wide, twenty feet long, four feet 
high at eaves, with double pitched roof made of tongued and 
grooved boards, so that roofing of any kind is not required. 
A roof of this kind will never leak, to any amount, if put up 
with lumber well dried out. 

Cypress is the best of all lumber for these houses, as it 
will stand the weather far better than any other kind, and 
will last for many years without decaying. White pine is 
the next best, and the only other kind of lumber that can be 
successfully used where no lining paper or roofing paper is 
used. Second quality lumber will answer every purpose if 
you use judgment in cutting it and putting it on, but you 
must have your lumber good and dry, so it will not shrink 
apart. 

Use the best lumber on north side and ends of house. A 
view of the frame illustrated elsewhere will aid you very 
much in building your first house. 



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POULTRY RAISING 15 

CHAPTER VI 

Directions for Constructing the Model Laying- House 

I will now try to tell you very plainly how to construct 
these houses, so that anyone that can use a saw and hammer 
ought to be able to build them. 

First square up your planks twenty feet long, then take 
your third plank and make two planks ten feet long each. 
Now spike your twenty-foot plank on your ten-foot plank, 
using twenty-penny nails, and you have a box twenty feet 
long and ten feet four inches wide, outside measure. 

Saw six pieces of 2 by 4, four feet long, then saw out each 
one of these 2 by 8. These make your corner posts and also 
your center posts. Spike these firmly on your plank box, one in 
each corner, and one in the center of house, letting the 2 by 8 
piece come on your plank. Nail from inside and let flat side 
come toward ends. This will make your outside even. Then 
saw four pieces 3 feet 4 inches long to double your corners 
with. These nail from plank up on each end. This will 
make them all even on ends and sides. Now take- a 2 by 4, 
just 20 feet long, nailing one on each side flatways on top of 
your uprights, even with ends and outside. Now take a 2 by 4 
ten feet four inches long, saw two inches out of each end, 
drop this in center of house on your plank, which drops bot- 
tom two inches below level of plank; spike firmly both ways. 
This keeps your house from spreading and is also a division. 
Take a 2 by 4 nine feet eight inches long, spike this at 
end of house, opposite end from door, between your 2 by 4 
even with top of plate. This piece stays and keeps your end 
from spreading and is also used to nail your end boards to. 
Now take two more 2 by 4, saw ten. feet three inches long, 
nail one in center of house to upright under plate, nail the 
other at end where your door goes in same way, using a twen- 
ty-penny nail — just one in each end — as both of these come 
out after your roof is on. These are used to keep house from 
spreading and are also used in putting roof on, as we lay a 
20-foot plank on them to stand on in nailing the roof on. 
Now saw two sets of rafters, each rafter 6 feet 8 inches long. 
Heel must fit on plate and have your top come together 
nicely. 

Make a pattern and keep it for future sawing, as you may 
have trouble fitting the first pair. 

Nail each set together on ground, then spike firmly on to 
your plates even with outside in each case. After this, put 



i6 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

in a ridge, a 2 by 4, 19 feet 8 inches long. Spike this in peak 
between your sets of rafters, letting- flat side come even with 
south side of house and upper edge even with peak. Spike 
firmly through end of rafters, using three spikes in each end. 
Then fit a pair of rafters in center of house, raising your ridge 
in center a little above a level. Then put in two cross-p.eces, 
three feet from peak on each side. Spike firmly through end 
rafters and ce.nter rafter, as your roof boards nail on these. 
Now put in your door studding in center of end. Then make 
your door about thirty inches wide, according to 
the width of your boards, and about six feet high. Put in a 
2 by 4 on each side, setting bottom on plank and sawing on 
lop to fit under rafter. Now put a short piece on top 
and you have your frame complete, except a 2 by 4 from 
door frame to corner of house, to nail your end boards to. 

Now you are ready for the siding. Take, if you use white 
pine, I by 8, 16 foot boards. Take 16 boards, sawing each in 
four feet lengths. This gives you 64 boards, four feet long. 
Begin at a corner, nailing one inch from top of plate, as your 
roof boards come over these and just pass it. See that you 
get your joints perfectly tight. 

After putting on both sides put on your ends, up and 
down same as siding. For roof boards saw 14 foot boards 
one-half inch from center. This makes-pne-half of the boards 
just one inch longer than the other. Now plane off that 
groove in first board. Let this project two inches over end 
of house. Put on the south side first, using your shortest 
boards nailing them about three-eights of an inch from the 
peak, as the boards on north side nail over these, and in this 
case you use no ridge board. 

Your roof boards should be very dry, and if put firmly 
together, you will have no leaky roofs. 

Next, saw out openings for your windows, and curtain 
frames. One opening for each. 

Just back of the center of the south side, cut opening for 
a glass window, nail a 2 by 4 lengthwise for window t'^ 
slide on. Put your other opening in towards front from cen- 
ter about two boards from center of house and under plate, 
just the same as the window opening was placed and fit a 
Irame covered with muslin instead of sash in this opening. 
See illustration. 

Saw a hole for letting out fowls in front part of house 
under the two openings and put in a slide which may be slid 
sideways with your feet. 

Now place your roosts. First, nail a strip up and down 
seven feet from back end. Put a 2 by 4 block on plank to 



POULTRY RAISING 17 

keep this strip out so window will slide in between. Now 
nail a seven foot strip from end of house to your short strip 
sixteen inches below top of plate. Do this on both sides and 
on these boards lay your roosts 2 by 3 ten feet long. About 5 
of these gives sixty hens plenty of room. You can notch your 
board one inch to lay them in. Do not nail them. 

Put in your feed hoppers and nests, and your house is 
practically complete. 



I will tell you in this connection how to make 
one of the handiest and best nests I know of, one of my own 
invention, very simple in construction, one anyone can make, 
who can use a saw and hammer. Take a tongued and grooved 
board (yellow pine is the cheapest), 7 1-2 inches wide 16 ft. 
long, sawed in two making two 8 foot lengths. Ta-ke 3 of these 
8 foot lengths, cleat them together with 4 cleats about 21 
inches long leaving i inch at back for nest to rest on a long 
cleat nailed to side of house when nest is put up. Nail another 
board on top of this in front which forms the front of youi* 
nests. Now saw 9 pieces 13 inches long and put one every 
foot. Nail these inside of board which forms your front by 
nailing through this board into each strip. At end of these 9 
pieces nail a 4 inch strip entire length 8 feet, and you have 8 
nests complete. In order to put a steep cover on your nests 
so no hens can roost upon the nest, you saw 6 boards same 
length as the bottom of your nests about 22 1-2 inches long, 
and saw on a slant from back side or from side of house to 
your front board so the nest is about i board high in front 
and 3 boards high in back. For a cover lay your first board 
even with outer edge of nest. The next board is nailed firmly 
to the 3 partitions also your next which will come to the siding 
just under plate; now hinge your first board to second, then 
sll you have to do to get your eggs is to raise your hinged 
board which gives access to all eight nests. The hens enter 
the nests at either end, on side nearest to wall of your house. 
I nail these nests against back side of house about 18 inches 
from floor. Leghorn hens easily jump in them. For larger 
breeds it is best to nail a short board at each end, 4 inches 
lov/er than opening. I find this set of 8 nests sufficient for 
75 layers. 



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BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



Diagram of End of House 



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POULTRY RAISING 21 

CHAPTER VII 

Making of Hoppers 

Your feed hopper should be made large enough to take 
a bag of feed of one hundred pounds, sufficient to last a flock 
of sixty layers, near two weeks. To make this, take a common 
hemlock board, twelve inches wide, for bottom and ends, 
saw a piece two feet long for bottom, two pieces three feet 
long for ends. Nail these together. Now use tongued and 
grooved boards for back and front. To put in your back, fit 
your hrst board inside of ends, letting it come on bottom in 
center of hopper and top edge of board even with back of hop- 
per, putting rest of back boards even with outside. Better 
put rest of boards on outside. Now for your front put first 
board, one inch from bottom and one inch from your other 
board, letting top of board come even with outside front 
of feeder, then board up on outside. This lets your feed 
come out in front. Now put a four-inch strip across front at 
bottom. This keeps your hens from throwing out the grain. 

You can also make a three-department box for oyster 
shells, grit and charcoal, which should be kept before them 
at all times — grit to grind their feed, oyster shells for lime 
in making shells, etc., and charcoal for a regulator. 

Another hopper which can be made at small expense and is 
grand for feeding beef scraps is as follows: Get a box at 
grocery store, say 15 inches long, 5 inches wide, and 10 or 
12 inches high; now board this box up tight; only leave a 
3-inch opening across entire front of box at top. Fill this box 
with beef scraps; hang on a nail by boring a hole near the 
top and your hens can eat until it is empty and no bother 
about clogging. Other sizes of boxes will work just the same. 
You can use one double this size for other feed. Your hens 
put their heads in this 3-inch opening and eat. Hang box 
close to the ground. These boxes will cost you nothing at 
grocery stores where you trade. 



22 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER VIII 

Care of Layers 

I will now tell you how to care for three thousand layers 
with but little labor, so you should clear $3,000 a year from 
them. 

If you have built your plant on a stream of water you 
will have no watering to do. 

Keep your feed boxes filled at all times. 

Never let them get empty. 

Your main feed is to be the best quality of wheat screen- 
ings. 

Your large hopper will take a one-hundred-pound bag of 
feed which should last a full week, often two weeks. 

You should make a round every week and fill all your 
hoppers — one with wheat screenings, one with beef scraps, 
rnd your three-department hopper with grit, oyster shells and 
charcoal. 

If your plant is built on a stream and inclosed with a 
good wire-netting fence, all the work you have to do during 
the week is to gather your eggs every night and at the same 
time give each flock of fowls two quarts of cracked corn in 
litter. 

Remember, your fowls should have wheat feed before 
them all the time, so they can safely have a light feed of grain 
every night. 

A horse and wagon should be used for making the rounds 
at all times. A good gentle horse that can be left standing 
and is afraid of nothing is what you want. 

From November until April you will have to make two 
trips a day to your houses. As cold weather comes on your 
windows and curtain fronts will have to be closed nights and 
should be opened again in the morning" when the sun shines 
and warms things up. 

On this same trip you should give your hens all the pro- 
cessed oats they will eat — about four quarts to each colony 
of birds. 

In case of heavy snow storms your hens can eat snow 
and they will lay just as many eggs as though they got to 
the brook to drink — and even more. 

Y^ou should keep the end of your house, where your nests, 
hoppers, etc., are, well bedded during the winter, and throw 
your grain in so as to give them" all the exercise possible. 



1 



POULTRY RAISING 



23 



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BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 




TYPICAL WHITE WYANDOTTE OCK 



POULTRY RAISING 25 

CHAPTER IX 

An J^gg Plant fo^' Profit 

To run a large poultry plant for the greatest possible 
profit, will require correspondingly more labor, but will pay 
the most profit, labor considered, of anything I know of at the 
present time. I have experimented to my entire satisfaction, 
and find that fowls, to be kept in perfectly healthy condition, 
should have free access to feed at all times, and they will lay 
fully one-third to one-half more eggs a year,— eggs that will 
hatch, for they will be produced in nature's way. 

I have found nothing better than good quality wheat 
screenings same to be kept before them at all times so you must 
keep a hopper of wheat screenings always before them ; also 
one of beef scraps, grit, oyster shells and charcoal. If possible 
in order to get your greatest profit, you should have a free- 
range plant such as I have described and I prefer Leghorns. Of 
all the Leghorn family there is none that will produce more 
eggs, larger and finer ones than the Single-Comb White Leg- 
horn. 

I am positive an average of 200 eggs a hen can be pro- 
duced under this system of feeding and caring for them. 

One good man can care for five thousand layers during 
the summer, providing some one looks after marketing of the 
eggs. But in winter care, say from November i to April i, 
it will keep two men busy. My aim is to tell you how to pro- 
duce eggs the year around in the greatest possible number. 

.1 will begin with the winter care, say November i, when 
your stock should all be properly housed in the colony houses 
I have already told you how to build. We will assume you have 
Leghorn plant of three to five thousand layers. We usually 
have much cold weather during November in this part of the 
state. Of course, you will have to vary this part of the sys- 
tem according to your own weather conditions. The first 
thing in the morning, as soon after daylight as convenient, 
start" out with a load of processed oats, and give each_ flock 
of sixty layers about four quarts each. If the morning is 
warm, open your windows. If cold, leave your windows 
closed until your next trip, after breakfast, about 8 to 9 a. m. 
If the morning is cold and freeezing, you should take a 
load of warm water and give each flock enough for the day. 
The finest thing I know of to water a large plant of this kind 
is a I 1-2 gallon butter crock. Get the low kind, for they 
are easily kept clean and require but little labor in filling. 
Even if your hens have free access to a stream of water they 



26 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

should be watered in their houses during the winter if you 
want a large egg yield. In the morning, when a hen comes 
off the roost, she is apt to be dry, especially if she is laying, 
and it is very essential at this time that she should have warm 
water to drink for cold water chills her and makes her dull 
and all humped up and the result is your egg yield stops. 

About one p. m. give each flock all they will eat again of 
processed oats. Feed this very liberally, as you will find that 
they will always be hungry for it. You cannot overfeed them 
on it. This is one of the greatest egg producing feeds I know 
of, and there is nothing which makes eggs so fertile. 

Hens will eat processed oats when they will look at noth- 
ing else. It can be produced for fifteen cents a bushel at the 
highest. I will tell you in my next chapter how to process the 
oats in the most convenient time-saving way. 

This one thing alone is worth hundreds of dollars to any- 
one who owns a large plant, as I will prove to you further on. 

For your last round, just before sundown, give each flock 
two quarts of cracked corn in their litter, to induce more ex- 
ercise. Gather your eggs and close up your windows if cold. 
If weather is very warm leave your window and muslin cur- 
tain open or partly open in scratching part. You must use 
judgment in these things. 

A plant cared for this way during the winter should give 
you fifty to sixty per cent egg yield right through, providing 
your pullets are of a laying age and your old hens have passed 
through their molt. 

You will see that I feed four times as much processed 
oats as I do any other kind of feed. Oats to a hen are what 
oats are to a horse. It gives them vigor and puts life in them, 
such as no other feed will do. 

If you follow these instructions to the letter, and use 
judgment in keeping your houses from getting too warm dur- 
ing the day, you will never fail to bring in a load of eggs 
every day in the year. 

Always empty your water jars at night on the last trip, 
so your hens will always be dry in the morning when you 
come around with the load of warm water. This is very im- 
portant. 

About II a. m. give each flock of 60 layers about one 
quart of green cut bone and at the same time, if weather is 
very cold, gather your eggs, for if you are saving them for 
hatching, care must be taken that they do not get chilled. If 
green bone cannot be easily obtained then keep beef scraps 
before them. 



POULTRY RAISING 



27 







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Si. 



28 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER X 
Processed Feeds and How to Froduee Thein 

The most wonderful feed known at the present time is 
sprouted oats. They are positively one of the greatest egg 
producers ever discovered and something that will make eggs 
hatch any time of the year. What would a horse be worth 
without oats? But very little. They are the same to a hen. 
The main objection to oats for fowls is their very tough hull, 
which is very hard to digest, and for this reason alone many 
people will not feed them to hens. I have experimented very 
extensively with oats and have fed them for weeks boiled, 
with no results in eggs. They make a very good fattening feed 
when boiled, but of no value for eggs — simply put the hens 
out of laying condition. But when processed, hens eat them 
in preference to anything else. In fact, they will eat them 
when they will touch nothing else, while on the other hand, 
they are the last thing to be eaten by the hens in their natural 
dry state. 

To process them, take a pail of good, ordinary oats, same 
as you feed your horses, cover them with water and let them 
soak five hours in summer and ten hours in winter, then turn 
them in a larger pail, one that will hold double the amount. 
First bore a one-half inch hole in your pail before turning them 
in, so it will not hold water; leave them in this pail until they 
sprout thoroughly and begin to germinate heat, which will 
be in three or four days if in a moderately warm place. Al- 
ways keep them covered with an old bag and stir and sprinkle 
with water once daily. After they become a mass of roots 
turn into a box holding about five pails. The oats should 
not be over three or four inches thick in the box. This 
must also have a couple of one-half inch holes in bottom so 
water will quickly drain ofif after wetting them each day. 

They will grow very rapidly when they begin to sprout, 
and are at their best for feeding when sprouts are one inch 
lo one dnd one-half inches long. One bushel will make four 
to five bushels if oats are good and grow as they should. 
Always keep oats covered with a heavy bag or old blankets 
to keep them warm, for they will grow much faster, and the 
sprouts will remain white and very crisp. By feeding when 
sprouts are only one-half to one inch long you not only get the 
full nutrive value of your oats, but they also take the place 
of green feed, and there is nothing I know of which will start 
hens laying so quickly and will bring so many eggs during the 



POULTRY RAISING 29 

year. On another page is shown a series of bins which will 
be found very useful and handy for processing oats and other 
grains. I am here simply giving the principle or reason of 
preparing the feed. 

For growing young chicks there is nothing as good as 
sprouted oats. Give your little chicks all they will eat twice 
a day after they are a week old. They are at their best for 
little chicks when sprouts are one-half inch long. 

If possible always grow them m a cellar, but in warm 
weather they can be grown under open sheds, under trees or 
north side of buildings. They grow at their best in a tem- 
perature of 60 degrees. 

For a large plant where you must grow them in large 
quantities you will find a series of bins the best plan. A 
large butter tub may be used if desired. Fill tub three- 
fourths full of grain and fill up with water and let them soak 
ten hours. If you soak two or three tubs at a time you can 
dump them all in one barrel, and leave them in this barrel 
until they sprout and begin to heat. They should be thor- 
oughly wet every day so long as they remain in the barrel, 
and as soon as they develop heat they must be dumped in 
boxes that have holes in bottom, say 3 to 5 inches thick, and 
wet and turned daily until ready for feeding. If 
they get too hot in boxes cool down with cold water and 
spread out thinner. To have them at their best you should 
start a lot every day and keep them fed up as fast as they get 
fit. You will soon learn just how many to start every day. 
A little salt distributed through them evenly when fed will 
greatly increase your egg yield and keep your hens in the 
pink of condition — a teaspoonful of salt to a common pailful. 
As an experiment I kept two pens of Leghorns six months on 
processed oats, with beef scraps before them with no other 
feed and they laid well all that time and went through the 
earliest molt of any hens on the plant, although I do not 
advise following this plan. If one has no cellar to 
grow their oats in, nor a warm place in winter they can be 
grown then in an open shed or barn by piling up a 
foot or more of horse manure, setting your box on it and bank 
your box on all sides with horse manure. Put on a board 
cover and throw over this a blanket and you can easily grow 
them in this way during the coldest winter weather. You 
can grow them much quicker in winter time by wetting them 
with warm water, but in summer time they should be wet 
with cold water. 

Processed oats make a great feed for ducks. Remember 
there is nothing that will grow chicks so fast as processed 



30 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



oats, and nothing so cheap. When they grow at their best 
they can be grown for fifteen cents per bushel or less. This 
feeding system alone is worth hundreds of dollars to any one 
with a big plant; and for small yarded plants it solves the 
green feed question entirely and will make any plant pay u 
profit. Leghorn pullets can be grown and be put to laying 
at four months of age on this feed. I have also done this 
with White Rocks and White Wyandottes. Never soak 
oats over five hours in summer or in a warm cellar in winter 
where a heater is run, for if you do you destroy the sprout- 
ing qualities of the oats. 

Barley is the next best grain for processing, and will give 
nearly as good results. Wheat and buckwheat can also be 
processed in same manner with grand results. 

To prove that processed oats is a discovery that I made 15 
years ago and is the greatest discovery for poultrymen known 
you will find it has been copied by various poultrymen as 
their own discovery, but not until the first edition of my book 
was put on the market was it seen in the poultry journals or 
advertised by others. 

It is not too much to claim for my system of processing 
grains, as do others who are successfully following my meth- 
ods, that it is the silo of the poultry world. 







PRIZE COMMING BARRED PLYMOUTH ROCK COCK 



POULTRY RAISING 31 

CHAPTER XI 

Summer Care 

For the summer care of flocks, beginning. about April i, 
or as soon as the ground can be worked, take a strip of land 
along the ends of your house, whicli end is most convenient, 
and plow a good-sized strip. If you have ten or twenty 
houses in a row, plow the whole length of them all, if you 
can. Now sow this strip liberally with oats, and if you can 
harrow this every morning so much the better, and sow light- 
ly of oats, three times a week until the coming November. 
Do this all summer long, using a spring tooth harrow, and 
your hens will work in this ground for the sprouted grain con*- 
tinually. As this grain keeps sprouting and coming up all 
the time you will have springtime for these hens from spring 
until November. If you follow this up the result in eggs 
will surprise you. The hen keeps right on laying all through 
the summer and fall, not even stopping when she is molting. 
1 claim under these conditions a two hundred to two hundred 
and fifty e^g hen can be a common thing. Flocks treated 
this wav should average two hundred or more eggs each, 
for you see the hens feast on an abundanc of worms and in- 
sects as well, and they will not consume more than half the 
quantity of beef scraps and other feeds when treated this 
way. 

In changing from winter to summer care, if your plant 
is laid out on a stream of water, as I have advised, you will 
have no watering to do, and just as soon as you get to plow- 
ing your ground you will not need to give as much beef scraps 
and give only one feeding a day of piocessed oats, as your 
hens will get all the oats they can eat, started in their natur- 
al way m the ground. The worms and insects they now 
get will take the place of green cut bone, so that all the work 
you have to do during the summer is to cultivate this ground 
and keep sowing oits and at night hitch up your horse and 
give each flock of fowls about two quarts of cracked corn 
and gather your eggs. If you follow up this system strictly 
the hens will "keep at it" all during the molting season. 
You must make your rounds every week during the summer 
and fill all your hoppers, one with beef scraps, and one with 
wheat screenings; also grit, oyster shells and charcoal. These 
Lssentials must be kept before them winter and summer. 
Never let the hoppers get empty. When freezing weather 
comes in the fall you must change your plans at once if you 



32 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



want the egg yield to continue. Remember this is how the 
profit comes in. Under no circumstances let your hens fall 
off on eggs. Start on your winter rations as I have outlined 
in a previous chapter, just as soon as severe weather of No- 
vember comes on. 

During the summer your windows are to be left open day 
and night; also your door, providing your plant is enclosed 
with a wire netting fence such as I have described in opening 
chapter of this book. 

You must remember another thing. If you let your 
fowls get knocked out in any way, through carelessness, it 
will take three or four weeks to get them back again, and in 
the meantime you have lost a month's laying of eggs. So 
great care and judgment must be used. Sickness will scarcely 
be known if my instructions are faithfully followed. Your 
hens should always be in the pink of condition, and your eggs 
from January to September should run 90 per cent fertile and 
give wonderful hatches. I think you will agree with me 
that this is caring for fowls the nearest to nature's way and 
under the best system known at the present time. 

During dry weather of summer always give one feed- 
ing a day of processed oats with a little salt on, do not neglect 
the salt at any time of the year as it is very important for a 
large egg yield. 




PAIR IDEAL ROSE-COMB RHODE ISLAND REDS 



POULTRY RAISING 33 

CHAPTER XII 

A Free Range Plant With Least Labor 

In this chapter, I will describe how to care for a free 
range plant with the smallest amount of labor and one 
helper. 

First, make a feed hopper, such as I have described that 
will hold a bag of feed. You should have three of these. Fill 
one with wheat screenings, one with oats and one with cracked 
corn. Also a small hopper for beef scraps and a three-de- 
partment hopper with grit, oyster shells and charcoal. If 
your plant is built on a stream of water and inclosed with a 
wire-netting fence, as I have already described, all the work 
you have to do is to gather your e^gs every night and send 
your man around once a week and fill all your hoppers. He 
should also spray carbolic acid and kerosene, half and half, 
well mixed, on the roosts once during the winter, and once 
a month during the summer. In September he should clean 
the houses out thoroughly and coat the floors over with new 
sand. Your hens will go to the creek to drink, and in winter, 
if ground is covered with snow, they will eat snow and will 
lay even more eggs. The hole to let them out of the house 
should never be closed, day or night, winter or summer. In 
the winter time your windows would have to be kept closed. 
Your hens will pay you a fine profit under this system with 
practically no labor. You will not get a big tgg yield during 
the winter, but you can depend on a profit of one dollar or 
more from each hen on this no-labor system. You will be 
surprised at the results. For a business man in the city, who 
owns a small place in the country and wishes to make some 
money at home, there is nothing I know of that will pay him 
so large a profit on the money invested as a poultry plant run 
in this manner. Of course, he would have to buy his 
breeders each season and the best way to do this is to sell off 
half of the stock during the early fall and replace them with 
pullets which can always be bought at one dollar each during 
September and October. Better birds for less money can be 
bought during these two months than at any other time 
of the year. One reason I specially advise Single-Comb 
White Leghorns in preference to any other breed, is because 
one can always buy all they want for one dollar each of good 
laying .«"tock. 

I advise changing the breeding stock at end of second 
year's laying, as two years is all a hen can be relied upon to 



34 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



pay a good profit and they should never be kept after this 
unless thev are extrr good ones that you may want to use as 
breeders. 




PRIZE WINNING WHITE PLYMOUTH ROCK HEN— WINNER OF MANY 

FIRST PRIZES 



POULTRY RAISING 35 

CHAPTER XIII 

Caring for a Tarcied Plant 

To handle a yarded plant for the greatest possible profit 
and for those who are so unfortunate as to own one, for such 
plants seldom pay unless it is used for breeding fancy stock, 
I have ,-xperimented for many months on yarded plants and 
1 find that hens even over crowded in small runs will pro- 
duce more than double the eggs fed on the hopper system 
than they will fed the ordinary way. Just keep good quality 
wheat screenings and beef scraps before them at all times and 
give a bberal feeding of processed oats in the morning — all 
they will eat and at 3 p. m., another feeding of processed oats, 
all they will eat Remember you cannot over-feed on the pro- 
cessed oatS; as they are light and quickly digested. At night 
in winter give a light feeding of cracked corn in litter and you 
will be surprised at the results. Your fowls will always be 
in the pink of condition and practically no sickness among 
them. Roup, colds and 'cholera will scarcely be known, even 
on the same plants that have always previously been oyer run 
with these various diseases where hot mashes were daily fed. 

Another valuable secret for a yarded plant, if your 
hens have long, narrow yards, say 10 by 60 or more feet long, 
is how to keep green feed in their yards all summer. Spade 
up half of the yard, sow it to oats early in the spring and 
put in cross boards eight inches high, cover it over with one 
inch mesh wire netting, stretching it tight and stapling it 
firmly to the boards. As soon as the oats get a good start 
your hens will eat them through the wire netting and the oats 
will grow just as fast as your hens can eat them off. In this 
way they will be supplied with green feed all summer long. 
I am satisfied a yarded plant can be made to pay run in this 
manner. Cut your hot and cold mashes entirely out. If pos- 
sible, feed green cut bone once a day. About 11 a. m. I find 
the best time for this. If you are in a position to get plenty of 
green cut bone, feed a yarded plant as follows : Keep a hopper 
of wheat screenings, also one of beef scraps, always before 
them, as well as grit, oyster shells and charcoal. Give a feed- 
ing of processed oats, in the morning and at 11 a. m. a light 
feeding of green cut bone ; 2 p. m. another feeding of process- 
ed oats, at night a light feeding of cracked corn in litter to 
induce exercise, and your fowls will keep in the pink of con- 
dition, lay well all winter long, and colds and roup will hard- 
ly be kiown if they are properly housed. They should be 



36 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



given warm water mornings in very cold weather, as they are 
always dry in the morning, and should not be allowed to have 
ice water. After they drink all they want of warm water in 
the morning, the rest of the day they will drink but little at 
a time .:nd cold water will not hurt them. If your houses 
have dropping boards you should clean the droppings off at 
least twice a week the year around. In the houses I have 
described for a free-range plant your droppings go right on 
the ground, and it is not at all necessary to clean them out 
oftener than twice a year. So you can see the amount of 
labor saved. 




PRIZE WINNING WHITE WYANDOTTE HEN— WINNER OF MANY FIRST PRIZES 



POULTRY RAISING i7 

CHAPTER XIV 

Hoiv to Build (in Ideal Incubator House 

I have told you in ni}'- former chapters how to produce 
eggs in the gieatest possible numbers, eggs that will give 
you the largest hatches. You will not want to know how to 
hatch them. First, I will tell you how to build what I con- 
sider the most perfect incubator house or cellar. Select a 
side hill if ycu have one near by ; for a perfect incubator 
house should be part under and part above ground. You can 
determine the size of house needed by the number of ma- 
chines you want to use and the number of chicks you wish 
to hatch. But it is always safer to build much larger than 
your present needs, then you will not have to rebuild or en- 
large when your business grows. 

First, lay up a wall of stone five feet high on all four 
sides, pitting in windows at the top of your wall; a four-pane 
window 8 by lo glass will answer the purpose nicely. Hinge 
at bottom so they w 11 open inside. 

Put windows in en each side and at south end. A win- 
dow every ten feet is about right. Now put a window in 
each end for ventilation. Put these windows near peak, a six 
light window, 8 by lo glass, and in summer these can be left 
open for ventilation, 'i his makes an ideal incubator house. 

Throw up dirt on top of wall on all sides, except south end 
and put in a double door here wide enough to carry out any 
incubator, set up. 

The air in such a house as this alwavs smells free from 
lamp smoke. If you fail to get good hatches in such a house 
you will know that it is not the fault of the house. 



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PEN OF SINGLE COMB WHITE LEGHORN"^— AMONG THE GREATEST OF EGG 

PRODUCERS 



38 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XV 

How to liitti (III Incnhator 

First, after setting up your machine and starting your 
lamp, you must let up or release your regulator. Keep un- 
screwing it until temperature goes up to 102 1-2 degrees. Re- 
member the temperature cannot raise when your disk over 
the lamp is raised. When you get temperature to 102 1-2 and 
your disk raised one-eighth of an inch, or so it just clears, then 
your machine is ready for the eggs. 

Better run your machine twenty-four hours after you get 
your temperature right before putting in the eggs. As soon 
as you put your eggs in your temperature will disappear; give 
your machine twenty-four hours to get back to 102 1-2 de- 
grees. Regulate ventilation according to directions sent with 
the machme you use. 

Chnnge trays from side to side in the morning and from 
end to end at night in a two tray machine, and turn the eggs 
at end of first day. After this turn twice a day until eight- 
eenth day. Turn last time at end of eighteenth day, but con- 
tinue to change your tray from side to side and end to end un- 
til you see the first pip. Handle your eggs very carefully 
from the eighteenth day on, using care not to jar them in 
changing trays. Remember animal heat begins to take place 
after the seventh day and the temperature will begin to work 
up and you should give the regulating nut part 01 a turn every 
time the temperature crawls up to 103, so as to keep it down 
as near 102 1-2 as possible, if you are operating your machine 
in a room which registers above 65 degrees ; if not over 40 
to 45 degrees, then keep your machine at 103 and do not air 
your eggs. 

In a room of 50 to 70 degrees begin airing your eggs on 
the fifth day and air each night, depending on temperature of 
room. 

A good airing for an hour or two on seventeenth day 
will much improve the hatch in warm weather. 

Give plenty of air during hot weather. 

Good, fresh eggs hatch much better than those kept two 
or three weeks. 

If you are hatching white eggs test them on the fifth day, 
and take out all clear eggs and dead germs 

If you are incubating brown-shelled eggs test them at 
the end of the seventh day, at which time you can test them 
nicel3\ 



POULTRY RAISING 



39 



All eggs should be tested again at the end of fifteenth day. 
Remove all dead eggs and if they do not show a good, fair- 
sized air cell you must give more ventilation, for a good 
hatch cannot be had without a good-sized air cell. 

After you see the first pip do not open your machine 
again under any circumstances until the hatch is practically 
through, say the morning of the twenty-first day for Leg- 
horns and at the end of twenty-first day for all large breeds. 

Leave chicks in incubator fully twenty-four hours after 
all are out. 

I have been experimenting for the past 20 years with in- 
cubators and have tried nearly all the leading makes running 
them side by side with eggs laid by same flocks of fowls 
and have given the moisture machines as well as the non- 
moisture machines every chance by running them through 
several hatches during an entire season and the results in 
every case were in favor of the moisture machines, and I shall 
not use any other kind in the future. In some cases I have 
hatched every fertile egg with moisture machines. My av- 
erage hatches from 40Q eggs set was 300 to 340 chicks and 
in many cases not a cripple or deformed one among them. 




PRIZE WINNING WHITE ORPINGTON COCK 



40 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XVI 
Chicks liaised Mature's Way 

Now comes the most difficult part of all, the business of 
raising the chicks. Here is where nearly all fail except those 
using my System and Secrets. 

First of all to raise chicks successfully and raise the 
greatest number you must have a proper place to raise them 
in. To raise chickens in February and March you must of 
necessity have a house and for this purpose there is no cheap- 
er or better house than the colony house I will here describe 
which should be built exactly like my laying house only 
1-5 smaller. Use 16 foot plank, making the houses 8 feet 
wide and 16 feet long outside measure, four feet high at eaves 
same as the laying houses. For the roof saw a 16 foot board 
into three pieces and saw rafters 5 feet i inch long. Build 
it the same as the laying house dividing it in center with 2 
10 inch boards, and you will have an ideal house for raising 
chicks in. Put windows and curtain opening the same size 
as you use in the laying houses, one in each side in center of 
each department. For the curtain opening make a frame 
out of a furring strip i inch by 2 inches and cover with muslin 
no glass to be used. Have windows so they will slide open 
towards the door also put a slide under each window for let- 
ting chicks out. In these houses place two of my indoor 
brooders such as I will give you plain instructions for build- 
ing in the next chapter. You can place any number of these 
houses in a row from 5 to 10 putting them about 30 feet apart. 
Try to fill one row of houses with chicks as near the same age 
as possible. All should be hatched within 2 or 3 weeks of 
each other. You can put 150 to 200 chicks in each house. 

To raise chicks on a large scale, say from three to six 
thousand, you must keep some one among them all the time, 
if you do not want them all carr'ed away by hawks and 
crows and various other animals, as there is nothing that has 
5.0 many enemies as young chicks. Hawks, crows, rats, weasels 
cats, skunks, wood chucks in rare cases, raccoons and foxes 
are the worst. 

Select a nice, large orchard if possible for raising chicks 
if you have one; if not you must arr?nge for artificial shade. 
About sixty feet in front cf the row of houses put a one and 
one-half foct fence of cne inch mefh wire netting; then an- 
other row of houses about eight feet from this fence; then 
c.nother fence, same as the other. 



POULTRY RAISING 41 

It makes no difference how many brooders you have in 
Hne, twenty could be handled all right if they were all filled 
with chicks at nearly the same time. 

If the field is nearly level they will equalize them- 
selves all right in the brooders. 

You can safely put seventy-five to 100 chicks in each 
brooder and should have no trouble in raising 70 to 90 per 
cent of them to maturity if you follow my instructions. 

For first feed I grind fine eggshells and feed these for 
first three days. You must see to it that they are never out 
of feed again as long as you own them. Here is one of the 
great secrets of success, for if your chicks always have free 
access to feed, they will never overeat and die of indigestion. 
As soon as you put them out give them fine grit and fine 
charcoal, also water that is lukewarm, and the eggshells, and 
as I have said before, the next day set dry mash before them. 
On the third day also set beef scraps before them and see 
that they are never without it. Begin feeding them process- 
ed oats on the seventh day. They will quickly take to it and 
eat off all the roots and sprouts, leaving nothing but the 
hulls. Feed them all the processed oats they will eat from 
then on, say twice a day. Do not be afraid, for they cannot 
overeat of it. 

From the seventh day on, your chicks must have always 
before them water, chick feed, grit, charcoal and beef scraps; 
and do not forget the oats. I generally set a panful in the 
pen first thing in the morning and again at noon, dumping 
out the hulls every time. It is a pleasure to raise chickens 
this way as sickness and disease is scarcely known. 

After three weeks add a good quality of wheat screen- 
ings to the rations, which must also be kept before them 
from then on as long as you own them. I know of nothing' 
that can in any way compare with it for growing young 
chicks, and nothing so cheap as screenings and processed 
oats. If you cannot get good screenings use wheat. 

Good, clean, fresh water is very important — in fact, thou- 
sands of chickens are lost every year through dirty water 
and filthy drinking dishes, as disease starts in the drinking 
tountains in many cases. 

If your fountains are not kept clean, and if you are not 
particular and wash out your fountains every time you fill 
them, slime collects on the inside, and this is rank poison to 
the chickens. 

The best fountain you can get is the two-piece earthen 
fountain, which keeps the water cool and clean. I would not 
use any other kind under any circumstances. If you can 



42 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

yard your little chicks on a stream of water, so much the 
better, ;is much labor is thus saved. 

Keep your brooder at 95 degrees first five days, then it 
^hould be lowered to 90 degrees, after two weeks to 85 de- 
grees, and after three weeks to 80 degrees gradually reducing 
ihe temperature and harden them off, depending on the sea- 
son of the year and the weather. Here is where common 
sense and judgment counts. Give your chicks heat just as 
long as they need it if you wish to attain the most rapid 
growth, and rugged birds of extra good size, such birds, as 
a rule, are never sick. 

I will give you the secret of success in raising chicks 
and getting them beyond the danger period, especially Leg- 
horns, that are from twenty to forty days old. Nature's 
way is the secret. 

In front of my colony houses used for brooders, say six 
feet I plow a good, big strip the entire length of them all. 
I do this the day the chickens begin to hatch, and sow this 
strip lightly with oats. By the time the chicks come out 
of their brooders the oats are nicely sprouted. I let the 
chicks cut of the colony brooders the seventh day about 10 
a. m., if the weather is nice. The next day I run the harrow 
over the ground and sow more oats. Every day after this 
I harrow this ground, sowing more oats every day. The re- 
sult — the chicks keep at work from morning until night and 
never get time to become sick. 

I consider this, the only good or perfect way to raise 
chicks, at least about the only successful way. Pullets raised 
this way should lay at four or five months of age. 

As soon as the chicks reach a weight of two pounds each 
or near this weight, the cockerels should be marketed — ex- 
cept those you desire to retain for breeders — these should be 
separated from the pullets in order to mature them in best 
^hape. 

Bear in mind the most critical time of a chick's life is 
between twenty and forty days old. During this period they 
must not be neglected, as they begin to grow rapidly at this 
age, and if stunted they never recover. 

You should sow more liberally of oats at this time, and 
do not neglect the harrowing; it takes but a short time each 
day and is very essential that it should be done with regu- 
larity. 

Continue to give your chicks all the processed oats they 
will take at this time. 

In order to economize and save labor, as soon as the 
chicks are large enough to leave the brooder you can move 



POULTRY RAISING 



43 



your pullets to the laying houses; that is, pullets that you 
want to keep for your own laying and breeding stock to ta^e 
the place of your yearlings. 

A convenient way to replace a flock of old hens with 
pullets is to just put up a lean-to on the back end of your 
laying houses — say 6 by 6 feet square would answer every 
purpose. This can be put up with a single pitch roof and a 
wire netting front. Put some low roosts in this lean-to and 
shut in about sixty of your finest, largest pullets for three 
days, then you can let them run with the hens. 

Feed pullets in their own department in an open trough, 
continuing same course of feeding which has already been 
begun. 

When you sell your old hens just shut chicks out of their 
temporary department and they will go right in the main 
house and never have to be taught. When they start to 
laying, they will keep right at it, and you will thus gain a 
full mouth's eggs as changing after they have reached the 
laying age always stops them. 

This lean-to is also very handy for shutting up setting 
hens and various other purposes. 

To go back to the young chicks again, when your chick? 
are large enough to think of roosting, and need heat no more 
you should market the cockerels for squab broilers, if possi- 
ble, at eight to ten weeks old, and remove your pullets to 
the laying houses. Your brooders are then ready for another 
batch of later chicks which can be allowed to grow up in 
these houses in the same manner as the first batch. 

You will find these houses very handy for wintering sur- 
plus cockerels and pullets in. It is always nice to have some 
surplus birds on hand. 

I think I have made things plain, and if you will follow 
my instructions you will have no trouble in raising your 
chicks, providing your eggs are produced under my method 
of feeding, from healthy stock. 




44 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 
CHAPTER XVII 
A Perfect Brooder 




ILLUSTRATION OF BROODER HOVER COMPLETE 



I will here describe the most perfect brooder I have ever 
used — one that is used exclusively on my plant. If you are 
handy ^vitll tools you can make these brooders very easily 
and at a small expense for materials. For the body of these 
brooders use a board 12 in. wide of hemlock or pine, saw two 
pieces three feet long and two pieces two feet ten inches long, 
nail these together at ends and you have a box just three feet 
square. On top of this box nail a sheet of galvanized iron 
3 fe.t squa-e ard around the edge on top of the galvanized 
iron on each side nail flatwise a furring strip i by 2, and 3 feet 
long. Now saw two more pieces two feet ten inches long^ 
to nail inside of these two pieces. First saw a 1-2 inch piece 
out of each end of these two pieces and nail between your 
♦hree feet pieces with your 1-2 inch cut down, now you are 
leady for your floor which must be made out of tongued and 
grooved white pine boards good and dry so it will not shrink. 
In the center of this floor saw a round hole so' a two quart tin 
basin will just nail over and around it with bottom. Nail 
around the flanges at the bottom the tin basin. Punch side 
full of holes with a punch to let fresh air and heat out among 
the chicks. On top of the basin as inverted, fasten the round 
block you sawed out of the floor. This must be done before 
basin is nailed on brooder. This block keeps your chicks 
from getting killed when the hover is raised or removed and 
let down again, also keeps the chicks from setting upon the 
heat drum. In body of brooder you must saw out an open- 
ing in center 9 by 10 inches. This opening is to put lamps in. 
Now make a slide for this opening and near the top make 3 
holes about two inches apart 3-4 inch in size. Near the bof 
tom also make two three-fourths inch holes. These holes are 
to provide air for the lamps. The holes must always be kept 



POULTRY RAISING 



45 



open or the lamps will not burn. You will now make your 
lioyer and this must also be made of tongued and grooved 
white pine and should be inside twenty-four inches square. 

Illustration of One-half of Brooder 




FROM THE CENTER TO THE BACK. 
SHOWING MANNER OF CONSTRUCTION, APPLICATION OF HEAT. ETC 

Around the edge put a strip of cheap cloth yet substantial, six 
inches wide ; slit this with a pair of shears. This strip of cloth 
should go twice around. Slit it so chicks can go out and 
under it at each corner. Put a leg six inches long of one- 
l^alf inch stuff three inches wide where you nail to brooder and 
Taring it down to 1-2 inch wide where it sets on top of floor 
cf brooder. This hover sets right over the tin basin. I 
always set these brooders in the corner of the house described 
in former chapter. This forms two sides and as the lamp 
•door is always toward you, I first nail a ten inch board along 
this edge of brooder opposite from the side of the house. This 
keeps the chicks from falling off; and on the lamp side and in 
front I put up a ten inch board and set this loose in a pair 
of cleats at each end so it can be easily removed as this is 
where the chicks are let out of the brooder down on the 
ground when five days old. To arrange for the chicks to 
get from the brooder to the ground, a distance of twelve inches 
I first put some dirt in front of brooder giving it a 
nice slope then I cover this over with grass sods. These 
sods keep the chicks from scratching the dirt away and once 
fixed m the sprmg they generally last an entire season. 

I consider this brooder far superior to any others I have 
used as you cannot overheat the chicks and no danger of 
•chilling so long as your lamps are burning. I never use a 
thermometer in these brooders any time oif the year. I put 
from 75 to loo chicks in each brooder using two brooders to 
-a colony house and have never lost even five per cent of 



46 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



chicks put in and often raise every chick. I find for 
lamps it is best to let a tinsmith make you a lamp out of gal- 
vanized iron that will hold about three quarts of oil. Make 
these lamps rather low and large around. Use a large sized 
zenith burner which is a burner needing no chimney. Run 
a low flame just so you can see it over the cone. Use two 
lamps under each brooder and fill them only once a week, 
but trim every day if your oil is poor. 



Illustration of Brooder Complete except Hover 




SHOWING POSITION OF VENTILATOR OR FRESH AIR 

OPENING ON THE LEFT SIDE 

A SIMILAR OPENING IS PROVIDED FOR. ALSO ON THE RIGHT SIDE 




A TRIO OF PRIZE WINNING S. C. WHITE LEGHORNS 



POULTRY RAISING 



47 




Co 



o 



!;i. 



48 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XVIII 
Raising Broilers — Bowel Trouble, Its Cause and Cure 

This chapter is written expressly for broiler men and 
those who keep their hens mainly on wet mashes. 

The failures in this branch led me to experimenting and 
I have carried on a series of careful experiments for several 
years until I have now fully satisfied myself that bowel 
trouble commonly known today as White Diarrhoea is a germ 
disease and the weaker your chick the quicker it will attack 
it. Now the next thing was to find something that would 
kill the germ and at last I have found it in what is known as 
Crel Oil. I spray my brooders thoroughly with it and cover 
lightly with wheat bran before putting chicks in, spraying 
once a week with it until the chicks are five weeks old and 
feed as follows : From the start put a small box of dry mash 
before them as described in my Poultry Secrets in the supple- 
ment to this book. I also give a light feeding of chick 
grain three times daily keeping fresh water, grit and charcoal 
before them and in some case I have raised every chick put 
out. All chicks intended for broilers hatched after May ist 
should have sweet milk to drink for three or five weeks, as 
this will grow them very rapidly and put them right through 
the critical period with scarcely any loss. I am now speak- 
ing more particularly of broiler raising. 

If you want healthy, rugged birds, free from disease, 
never feed them a wet mash. 

The cheapest way to feed and have healthy, rugged breed- 
ing birds free from disease at all times to raise broilers from 
is as I have told you, except in place of a light mash at 9 a. 
m., give your hens a good feeding - of processed oats. 
If you produce eggs in this way, from yearling hens 
mated with fully developed cockerels, not less than 
ten months old, you can raise practically every chick 
you hatch, even if a piped brooder-house is used pro- 
viding you can keep the temperature, anywhere from 80 
to 95 degrees. This is a big variation ; but strong, healthy 
chicks will stand a lot and not get sick. Once they get sick 
this is the last of them, for they will die about as fast as you 
can hatch them. 

Most breeders, who are in the fancy stock raising, use 
hens for hatching and brooding them. They get their 
neighbors to hatch and raise for them, for they cannot hatch 
them and raise them with incubators and brooders, simply 



POULTRY RAISING 49 

because their breeders are fed on wet mashes, so as to get a 
big price are usually hatched by old hens and raised by them 
on free-range, which will pull them through if anything will. 

Under my system of feeding, eggs laid in January will 
run 90 per cent fertile, and I have hatched as high as 93 3-4 
per cent of fertile eggs. 

Yo'i can see at a glance why so many who have tried 
the broiler business as a business have failed. I defy any 
one to find a profitable broiler plant, but I am satisfied this 
branch can be made to pay under my system of feeding and 
in no other way. 

I want to say to broiler men, who have piped brooder 
houses, give them one more trial with eggs produced under 
my system of feeding. 

From January until June you can hatch and raise broil- 
ers at a splendid profit under this system, for you can grow 
your later hatches up and make roasters of them at a grand 
profit. Under my system of feeding your birds will grow very 
lapidly and develop fully one-third quicker than if fed the 
old way, stuffed with wet mashes. If fed the old way you 
will lose a large number with colds and roup, and have but 
few well chickens to sell. 

Just a word about growing roasters. Either good wheat 
screenings or wheat of some description must be kept before 
them all the time; also first-class beef scrap, grit, charcoal, 
and good fresh water and never let them get out of dry mash. 
They should have one good feeding of processed oats about 
9 a. m. — all they will eat. At night give all the cracked corn 
they will eat and you will grow roasters that will be a credit to 
you, ani sickness among them will scarcely be known, and 
your profit will correspondingly surprise you. 

Howevei. you will find it to your advantage to market 
chicks as broilers as long as they bring 25 cents a pound and 
more. 

A pan of corn meal, set where the chicks can eat all they 
want of it, a week or two before marketing them will fatten 
them nicely. Do not wet it, but let them eat it dry. 

Under these conditions only can broilers be made to pay 
a profit. You cm raise them well into the summer on the 
free-ranp^e system of cultivating the ground. Just as soon 
as you fail to raise 80 per cent of your hatch you had better 
stop ani sell your eggs. 



50 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XIX 

Colds a?id Roup 

Of all the diseases that poultrymen have to contend with 
there is none so prevalent as colds and roup and they are there- 
fore the most dreaded. Owing to the very sudden changes of 
weather in nearly all parts of our country colds and roup 
seem to grow more prevalent each season. The most dan- 
gerous form of roup is canker accompanied with swelled eyes 
which fill with a white cheesy substance and means a blind 
eye in nearly every case. This particular disease is very con- 
tagious therefore a chicken that has a sore eye should be re- 
moved at once from the flock and in many cases it is the wise 
thing to kill and bury or burn the first case seen of this kind. 
The treatment should begin at the time they are hatched for 
this is a germ disease. Spray your brooders with Crel Oil 
before you put your hatch in and spray once a week there- 
iifter, as long as chicks are in brooder. Their quarters after 
this should be sprayed twice a month until fully grown and 
once a month when grown. All chicks hatched in March and 
April should never get a cold or trace of roup treated this 
way unless you are breeding from old stock that have had it ; 
or unless your chicks are in very damp quarters or roost in 
drafts. This Crel Oil also kills all lice and mites. Colds 
and roup often gets a start from mites during hot weatlier 
of summer. Mites multiply very fast in hot weather and they 
so weaken the chick that in their weakened condition they 
take cold very easily. If roup gets a good start spray every 
night with Crel Oil and put 1-2 teaspoonful to i gallon of this 
in their drinking water. This will cure the worst cases in a 
short time. Many a plant has been put out of business by 
roup, so let me warn you to watch your birds closely and do 
not let it get a start. Late hatched chicks are very susceptible 
to this disesae and, therefore, require close watching. 





POULTRY RAISING 51 

CHAPTER XX 

Caring for a Flant where Wheat or Screenings 
Cannot be Bought 

I want to lay down here a system of feed'ng for those 
who hve in sections of the country where wheat screeninj^s 
cannot be bought and where wheat is so high it cannot be 
used at a profit and where oats are so scarce and high in 
price that they cannot be used. In places of this kind I ad- 
vise hopper feeding of dry mash entirely. This should be 
made up of the various ground grains that >ou can get the 
cheapest, using 1-4 to 1-3 wlieat bran if it can be had. You 
will have to use your own judgment as a rule in the making 
of this mash. I would not hopper feed any kind of whole 
grain bat feed this raiher in the litter mornings. Barley or 
buckwheat or Kaffir corn whichever is cheapest is good. At 
night feed corn; also if possible keep beef scraps before them 
at all times. You are bound to get a big t^^ yield under 
such a system of feeding, especially if you can process some 
kind of grain, if not oats, try barley or buckwheat ^r Kaffir 
corn. If you can get a grain to process, feed this processed 
grain once a day with a little salt on and if you have a plenty 
of it feed it twice daily. Remember oats is the best of all 
grains f you can get it. This system is especially adapted 
for those who live in some parts of California as well as Flor- 
ida and other remote Southern points. 




A FLOCK OF HANDSOME PEKIN DUCKS 



52 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXI 

When and How to St<(rt in the Foiiitry Business 

Now comes the important consideration, when to start, 
i^nd how. In either case you should start in the fall, especial- 
ly if you wish to start on a large scale, for your buildings 
should be put up in the fall even if you start by buying eggs 
and plan to raise your own breeders. This is by far the 
cheapest way to start if you do not have much capital. Get 
your incubator house ready in the fall, providing you have not 
a house cellar, which will answer the purpose temporarily. 

You can arrange for your brooders in the spring, but 
cannot start so early as where you have a brooder-house as 
out of door brooders will be necessary in this case which 
cost more. Regular out-door brooders can be used out of 
doors very early in the spring any time after March ist, as a 
rule. Pullets hatched the middle of March should lay in Aug. 
under my system of feeding, and keep right at it from then 
on. All the eggs desired can be purchased from reliable part- 
ies or either Single-Comb White Leghorns or White Wyan- 
dottes, produced under my system of feeding at $5 per one 
hundred in any quantity on short notice — eggs that will run 
90 per cent fertile right in January. For those who are well 
fixed, financially, I advise starting in the fall. To such I 
advise putting up the laymg-houses during July and August 
buying pullets as early as possible during the fall. October 
and November are usually the two best months as they can 
be bought cheaper than at any other time of the year. 

You should have no trouble to buy all the pullets and 
yearling hens you want particularly Single-Comb White 
Leghorns during these two months at $i. to $1.50 each. This 
is a very satisfactory way to start, but not so cheap as buying 
the eggs and raising your own stock . 

Avoid buying eggs of a breeder who feeds mash if you 
wish to get good hatches and produce chicks that will live, 
because when an entirely inexperienced man tries to raise 
them they must be from hardy stock. 

You do not have to wait many months for profit when 
you buy eggs to start with, as you can market your cockerels 
for broilers at a profit In three months from the time you 
set your machines you can count on quite an income, so all 
things considered, with the experience you get, I advise start- 
ing in the spring by buying your eggs and raising your own 
breeders. 



POULTRY RAISING 



53 



Your chicks can be raised very cheaply under my new 
system, giving them all the processed oats they will eat twice 
a day, in connection with a good chick food kept before them 
all the time, as well as grit, charcoal, and beef scraps. 

Your brooders should be cleaned out at least once a week 
■which I find answers every purpose. Also keep your brooder 
part of the house, where chicks are fed, covered with cut 
clover, they eat much of this, and it is very beneficial to them. 




TYPICAL S. f. WHITE LKtilloKN i. UCK 



54 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXII 

A Leghorti Plant for Profit 

I will tell you here what a Combination Leghorn Plant 
< an be made to do, and how to run such a plant for the great- 
est possible profit. 

First of all your great aim must be the production of eggs 
and for at least six months in the year you must feed to pro- 
duce not only eggs that will hatch but produce eggs that will 
hatch chickens, that will live. If you feed properly and ad- 
vertise eggs for hatching, actually producing fertile eggs that 
will hatch strong, healthy chicks, that will live if given half 
a chance, offering to replace all clear eggs free if returned, ex- 
press prepaid, I am positive a man with three thousand layers 
can clear from $8,000 to $10,000 a year, providing he feeds 
them on my free range system. 

You should sell your eggs during the hatching season for 
$6.00 per 103, or $50 per 1,000. Possibly you could make 
more money by selling them for $5 per 100 in any quantity 
making no reduction for quantity. $5 per 100 is the popular 
price for good hatching eggs in this country. There is a 
grand profit in it at this price when you produce them in such 
laige numbers at so small a cost. 

You must not feed a bit of wet mash. I will lay down 
here the ideal way to feed for fertile eggs at a small cost either 
a yarded or free-range plant for Leghorns only. 

Beginning in December, the first thing in the morning 
as soon as it is light, give 3^our hens a 1 ght feeding of buck- 
wheat or barley in the litter; about i 1-2 quarts for 60 or 75 
is plenty. Give warm water to drink as early as convenient, 
and at 9 a. m. give each flock all the processed oats they will 
eat. At I p. m., give your flock more water, or put in warm 
water with what they have. Give on this trip a light feeding 
of green cut bone — a quart to a flock of sixty, if they will 
eat that much, if not, cut them down to a pint. 

About 3 p. m. give another feeding of processed oats, all 
they will eat. Remember, these only cost 10 to 15c a bushel. 

Before dark give not over i to i 1-2 quarts of cracked 
corn to a flock, and gather your eggs. If it is very cold 
weather, you will also have to gather your eggs on your i 
o'clock trip. 

These birds must have ./"ways before them grit, oyster 
shells, and charcoal. Also a hopper of beef scraps and one 
of wheat screenings or wheat. 



POULTRY RAISING 55 

Just a word about mating up your breeders to produce 
chickens that should be health3\ 

Mate all your yearling hens with cockerels, not less than 
ten months old. Put these birds on a free-range system, and 
feed as I have heretofore directed. 

Pullets hatched in February and March, mated to good 
vigorous yearling cocks, will also produce chickens that are 
very hardy and you should have no trouble in raising 90 to 
95 per cent of these chicks. 

Under no circumstances use anything but a single-comb 
White Leghorn for the greatest profit, because they lay 
the largest egg, and are by far the most popular of the Leg- 
horn family. 

To dispose of your breeders to the best advantage during 
August and September, you should make a great clearance 
j^ale at $1 each. You will have no trouble in disposing of all 
surplus stock at this price, and you will find this far prefer- 
able to putting them in the market. 

Care for your plant during the summer as I have in- 
structed for summer care and feeding in another chapter. 

I advise four cocks or cockerels for every sixty to sev- 
enty-five layers. These birds should be so mated that there 
will be no fighting among them, and no "boss," as a rule. 

After the breeding season is over, say July, you should 
remove nearly all your male birds and make one flock of them 
except a few pens, which it would be well to keep mated the 
season through, so you can always fill a stray order for hatch- 
mg eggs. 

Your cockerels should also be separated from the pullets 
anr. placed in one large flock, or several flocks of one hundred 
or so m a flock. In this way the male birds run together 
very peaceably and rarely ever fight, and you rarely ever see 
a "boss" among them. 

In mating these up, just take out of the bunch as many 
as you want for a flock of females, all at once, and let them 
go.^ You will then have no fighting, and very seldom even 
a "boss." This is the only way to mate up your birds for 
the best possible results. 

^ Never keep a brassy male bird. Have nothing but pure 
white birds on your place, as you will find your profits can 
be greatly increased by gradually breeding into fancy birds. 
Show a few at your fall fairs or local shows. Get a 
Standard and study it. By careful selection you can soon 
have a plant of very fine birds. 



56 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



Advertise your stock in one or more of the leading poul- 
try journals and keep your advertisement regularly before 
the public. 

Do not try to show at the big shows, such as Madison 
Square Garden, or Boston at first, for it takes years to win 
at such shows as these. 

If the houses I have given you the plans for in this book 
are not warm enough for your location, you can build them 
six feet at the eaves instead of four by using a twelve-foot 
board sawed in half. Put a loft-floor in at the eaves and fill 
the top with straw. Do not put on a tight loft-floor; a floor 
of poles would work all right. You should also line the sides 
in the same way, and you will have a very warm house, where 
you could get eggs in any kind of weather. 

I want to say right here that Leghorn plants are the only 
ones up to the present time that have made money in a market 
way. Eggs for market, at market prices, have made many 
of them rich. 

All who have tried the larger breeds, have failed at it in 
a market way, so they have all had to go into the fancy, or 
give it up entirely. 




A PAIR OF PRIZE WINNIXC SILVER LACEU WYANDOTTES 



POULTRY RAISING 57 

CHAPTER XXIII 

A White Wyandotte Plant for Profit 

I have bred White Wyandottes all my life, that is for the 
past eighteen years and exhibited them every year. I have 
seen them lead all the large breeds in popularity, and the 
demand for them increases yearly. I know of no variety 
among the large fowls that it is such hard work to get good 
fertile eggs from that will hatch strong chicks, that are bound 
to live, as it is from the White Wyandotte that have been 
bred for exhibition purposes in yarded plants. 

In breeding exhibition stock every trace of creaminess 
or brassiness had to be bred out of them, and their vigor or 
vitality has gone with it to a large extent. 

Inbreeding has done much to injure the vitality of this 
breed. 

My aim here is to tell you how to feed and care for White 
Wyandottes so you can get them hardy and full of vigor 
without breeding out their fine qualities — and this can be 
done by feeding alone. 

I have experimented very carefully along this line and 
I find all large breeds should be fed quite different from the 
small breeds. 

First of all they should never eat corn in any form — that 
is, the breeding stock. If any corn it must be very limited 
quantities. 

I find they will stand the hopper feeding and give grand 
results. In fact, this is the only natural way of feeding any 
fowl, and the only safe way of feeding. 

First of all provide a hopper of beef scrap and wheat 
screenings; also grit, oyster shells, and charcoal. The first 
thing in the morning giv» a light feeding of barley or buck- 
wheat in litter to induce all the exercise you can. 

At 9 a. m. give all the processed oats they will eat. 

At I p. m. a light feeding of green cut bone, a pint to 
a quart for sixty layers. 

At 3 p. m. all the processed oats they will eat agahi. 

At 4 p. m. or later, according to the time of year, another 
feeding of oats, unprocessed. This should be fed to all large 
breeds in place of cracked corn. 

Always use clipped oats, and feed in the litter, and you 
will not only get an abundance of eggs, but eggs that will 
hatch strong healthy chicks that will live. Such eggs will 
run from 80 to 90 per cent fertile right in the winter months. 



58 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

I am not guessing at this, for I am doing it right in Feb- 
runry. 

Do not be afraid of the processed oats, but give all they 
will possibly eat for they are very light and it is impossible 
to over-feed on them. There is nothing I have ever tried 
thr.t will make hens lay equal to them, and nothing so cheap. 
It costs only about half to feed this way. 

You can always sell any amount of eggs for hatching at 
$5 per one hundred from Wyandottes. 

I am positive you could sell all a three thousand laying 
pk'Ut can produce for hatching by a liberal amount of adver- 
tising along the same lines as I told you how to advertise 
Leghorn eggs. 

\"ou can sell a large quantity of breeders for good prices, 
if you start with fairly good stock and exhibit at the small 
shows on the start. 

One thing you have to contend with on a Wyandotte 
plant, that you do not have to contend with on a Leghorn 
plant, and that is setters. This means quite some work, but 
you will not have nearly the amount of setters on a plant fed 
as I have directed. 

To properly break up a setter, t]iey should not be allow- 
ed to remain on the nest the first night, and as a rule three 
days will break them up. Or, if you want to break a setter 
up in twenty-four hours, just put her with a bunch of sur- 
plus cockerels, where a roost is handy and your hen will not 
think of setting. 

There is no breed at the present time more handsome 
than the White Wyandotte, when bred for show purposes, 
and no fowl that makes so fine a broiler and roaster when they 
are grown up healthy and rugged, that is, nature's way, and 
this can be done easily on the feeding I have outlined for my 
free-range system. You can get eggs right in January that will 
run from 80 to 90 per cent fertile ahd give you grand hatches 
of strong, rugged chicks that can be easily raised in the win- 
ter — and you will have no trouble at all to dispose of hun- 
dreds of laying pullets during September, October and No- 
vember at $2 each. There is a grand profit raising at this 
price, when you can raise 90 per cent and more of all the 
chicks you hatch, and raise them largely on a feed that 
costs you only 10 to 15 cents a bushel. You can easily see 
what a piofit you can make by running a laige plant of 
White \V>andottes my way. 

Smallness of your feed bills will surprise you, 

I am positive $8,000 a year can easily be made from a 
plant of three thousand White Wyandotte layers, and even 



POULTRY RAISING 



59 



more when you work into high-class show birds and get $3 
to $5 a setting for many of your eggs. 

Sell high-class birds from $10 each up to as high as $100 
It can be done by pluck and perseverence. 

A White Wyandotte plant of three thousand layers will 
turn in a greater profit than the same number of any other 
breed fed and run my way, which is nature's way, providing 
it is handled by a White Wyandotte fancier who thoroughly 
knows the value of his birds. 

The system that has been described above for the care 
and feeding of White Wyandottes will be found to be corre- 
spondingly practicable for other large breeds of fowls, and 
should be followed with the same accuracy. 




A TURKEY PRODUCED AFTER TUE BRIGGS SYSTEM 



6o BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXIV 
A CojnbinatioTi Plant for Profit — Fruit, Poultry and Bees 

I feel that I must write a chapter on a combined plant 
for the benefit of those who want to go in either on a small 
or large scale, combining poultry, fruit and bees. 

There is no combination that I know of, that is more 
profitable, and at the same time will give so much pleasure 
in various ways than this. First of all, every poultry plant 
should be well set out to fruit. This is one of the very first 
things you should do to provide your poultry with shade and 
a peach tree is one of the best fruit trees for poultrymen, as it 
gives the quickest shade of them and the fruit finds ready 
sale at good prices. Then the plum and the apple, 
cherry, pears and grapes come next in value. You are bound 
to get an immense crop of fruit where you cultivate your 
ground, and use your poultry manure around your trees. 
You should plant liberally of all kinds of fruit, and you will 
find life worth the living. 

You want bees to fertilize your blossoms, so you will get 
large crops of fruit, and bees for the honey are very profitable 
and aflford a great amount of pleasure. 'l*hey often turn in a 
greater amount of profit, time and capital taken into consid- 
eration, than anything I know of. I have cleared as high as 
$25 from a single hive in a season with but little labor. You 
need to give them no attention to speak of from October i to 
May I. For only two months. May and June, do they need any 
great amount of attention. 

I advise every one who keeps poultry to have a combined 
plant — poultry, fruit and bees. 

There will be years when your profit from fruit alone will 
nol only give you a good living, but will give you a good, fat 
bank account as well as furnishing the family what fruit is 
needed. Think of eating peaches for instance from the ist 
of July until November, it makes ones mouth water. This 
can be done, if you will plant several kinds from the earliest 
to fhe latest. You can also have all kinds of apples, plums, 
cherries, and other fruit in the same way, grown at no ex- 
pense, on your poultry farm and one should enjoy life under 
such circumstances. 



POULTRY RAISING 6i 

CHAPTER XXV 

Loss of Breeders during Heavy Laying Season 

I want to devote a little time to the discussion under this 
head of the matter of heavy loss of hens during the heavy 
laying season, during March, April and May principally. This 
applies largely to Leghorns as they are the phenomenal layers 
during these three months and the loss of birds from heavy- 
laying is usually very heavy. The Rhode Island Experiment 
Station lost nearly 34% of their Leghorns in one year. This 
information will surprise and startle many, but all poultry- 
men who keep stock in large numbers know the loss is very 
heavy. This great loss is caused by such heavy laying as to 
weaken the bird. They droop two or three days and die. I 
have been making a study of this trouble in order to find out 
how to avoid the loss and from careful experimenting I am 
now satisfied beyond a doubt that this trouble primarily is a 
germ disease which gets a stronger hold on a hen when she is 
w:eakened from heavy laying and as a result she dies in two or 
three days. I have also found that nearly all the loss of poul- 
try is caused by germ disease, therefore the only cure is to 
destroy these germs. For this I have found nothing equal to 
Crel Oil. The roosts and dropping boards if used should be 
sprayed with this every week, sure from January ist on for 
six months or until the heavy laying season is over. Spray just 
before hens go to roost. If you follow this up closely you 
will not only get many more eggs but your loss in hens will 
be nothing to speak of. You will get $ioo in return for every 
$25 spent in Crel Oil. It is also a sure cure for gapes in young 
chickens. You should always have a supply on hand. 




62 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXVI 

Molting 

Molting is an important consideration especially on a 
yarded plant, but on a free-range plant I believe in keejnng 
thtm laying right through the molt. As a rule, when a hen 
practically has an entire new coat she will in most cases stop 
laying and take a rest. A hen must have a rest and time to 
build up. On a free-range plant, if you continue your harrow- 
ing and sowing oats you can keep your birds laying pretty 
well all through without reducing their vitality. During Oc- 
tober and November, they will drop off and have the rest; 
then you should have your pullets under full head if you are 
in the market e^^g^ business. But if yqu depend on selling 
eggs for hatching, then I advise 3''ou to let your hens 
have a rest during November and December, and get them 
under full headw^ay again in January, you will then 
be able to produce eggs that will hatch, and with other things 
favorable, your eggs should run 90 to 95 percent fertile from 
January I on, and hatch equal to eggs laid in March and 
April, providing your hens are fed under my system. 

In caring for a yarded plant, you will find your hens will 
slack off laying during July and Aus-^ust, and during Septem- 
ber, October and November you will get but few eggs from 
the large breeds, as a rule. All things considered, and in or- 
der to get your stock in the best possible condition for winter 
eggs, I advise keeping your hens on nothing but processed 
oats and beef scraps during this period, for this will put them 
through the earliest molt of anything I have ever tried. The 
oats should contain sprouts one-half inch long. You will al" 
so be surprised at the amount of eggs you will get even dur- 
ing this period. 

December ist put before them their hoppers of wheat 
screenings or cheap wheat and to every pail of processed oats 
add one teaspoonful of cayenne pepper and one of salt, which 
will make your hens very thirsty, and the more water they 
drink the more eggs they will lay. Your hens will respond 
to this treatment and surprise you on eggs and should lay as 
well during January as any month in the year. Use the cay- 
enne pepper during December, January and February only. 



POULTRY RAISING 63 

CHAPTER XXVII 

Feeding and Selection of Large Breeds Important 

Those who have a love for certain large breeds and wish 
to keep them, even if their profits are not so large, 1 desire 
now to particularly address. Many of those who have read the 
preceding pages of this book may get the impression there is 
no profit in any other breeds except the ones I have stroni;ly 
advised. I do not want any one to think this, for any one with 
push and advertising can boom any breed to a certain extent, 
but this takes money. I will name some of the most import- 
ant large breeds for which there is a good demand and money 
in. Barred and White Plymouth Rocks, Buff Orpingtons; 
also White and Black Orpingtons; Columbian Wyandottes 
and the very popular and valuable Rhode Island Reds, the 
preat winter layers, and for broilers their eggs have a great 
sale. Two of the handsomest of the large breeds, which are 
now much neglected, are the Buff Wyandottes and Buff Ply- 
mouth Rocks. They are great layers, and it remains for some 
good fancier to again bring them to the front. There is money 
in any of the breeds I have named, as well as others. All 
large breeds need free-range to do their best, as they do not 
stand confinement nearly as well as the Leghorns, I find. For 
those favorably located on farms and who can raise crops, the 
ideal way of feeding all large breeds during winter for the most 
eggs and for yarded plants the year round is as follows : By in- 
troduction , I may say, however, that this same system can 
be applied to Leghorns with wonderful results. It will pro- 
duce the most fertile eggs of any system in existence, no mat- 
ter what anyone tells you. Now, instead of hopper feeding, 
you must raise a piece of wheat, or barley and oats, and when 
ripe cut it and bind it in sheaves and put it in your barn. 
Do not thresh it ; but in November begin to give it to your 
hens in the sheaf and let them thresh it. Give a sheaf the 
first thing in the morning, and 9 or 10 a. m. give a feeding of 
processed oats, and if they need more grain, depending on the 
Mze of your flock, you can give another small sheaf at noon, or 
give a light feeding of cracked corn in the straw, and at 3 130 
to 4 p. m. give another feeding of processed oats with some 
"Egg-maker" mixed in with them according to directions that 
come with it, and you will never fail to get an abundance of 
fcggs; at the same time your birds will be in the pink of con- 
dition and the eggs produced under these conditions will not 
only give you wonderful hatches of chicks, but chicks that 



64 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



will live and grow with half a chance. You will see that in 

this special case I have cut out beef scraps, for good beef 
scraps are very high and sometimes hard to get, therefore, I 
have replaced it with the "Egg-maker," which I have been 
carefully experimenting with and it has given me excellent 
results during winter months and kept the birds in the pink of 
condition. This can also be mixed with processed oats for 
little chicks with grand results. Fresh cut bone, three times 
a week, is excellent where you can conveniently get it during 
hatching season, but is not absolutely necessary. Always 
keep dry mash before them made by my formula. 










A PRIZE WINNING BLACK MINORCA HEN 



POULTRY RAISING 65 

CHAPTER XXVIII 

To Erect a Yarded Plant 

First you will want a good laying house, and in order 
to house a large number of birds at the least possible expense 
and economize in labor, I advise a plain house without an al- 
leyway, one about 80 feet long, for in a house without an al- 
leyway you must open all the doors in passing through. 1 
would divide this house into eight pens, 10 by 15 feet. The 
corner dimensions for the house 15 feet wide, 80 feet long, 
7 feet high in front and 5 feet in rear ; \yith one fair sized win- 
dow in each department about two feet from the ground. Fit 
your windows loose and slide up to roof. Make holes for let- 
ting hens out under the window, fitting wooden slides very 
loose to slide sideways so you can open and shut them with 
your foot. Put in wire netting partitions every ten feet and 
hang your doors one foot from front of house with spring 
hinges, and have them all swing one way, then you can walk 
right through the house and your doors will always close 
themselves behind you. In making the partitions you should 
always run a ten inch board across at bottom and the doors 
should swing over this. You can also fit a pan on shelf 
over this board, between partitions, part in one pen 
and part in the other, and in this way water two flocks 
at once. The nests can go on one side and the feed hop- 
pers on the other. This house should be filled in with at 
least six inches of sand and then it will always be dry. Drop- 
ping boards can be placed on back side of the house; a plat- 
form three feet wide is about right. Place three roosts over 
it ten inches apart, all on a level, one foot from plat- 
form is about right. You can keep thirty Leghorn layers 
and two male birds to a pen nicely in such a house as this or 
if larger biids, twenty-four females and two male birds. These 
should have yards 50 to 150 feet long the longer the better and 
these yards should at once be set out to peach or plum trees 
for shade, and cultivated about several times di^ring the sum- 
mer, if possible. 

You will need a feed-house handy by for feed. You can 
use your own judgment in building this; size will depend 
largely on size of plant. I advise a board floor in this and 
you can put bins in and also leave a part lor a picking or 
dressing room. 

A good brooder-house is the next thing needed. The 
length of this will depend upon the size of the plant you are 



66 BRIGGS' SYSTEAi UF 

to build or the amovint of room you have at your disposal. 
It is always best to build larger than you need. I advise a 
house fully 15 feet wide; and I would raise it one foot from 
ground on posts and put in a board floor. Would also board 
this one foot space up with rough boards. I would build this 
house 7 feet high at the north side, and 4 1-2 feet at the south 
side, using a single pitch roof. Put along north side a 3 foot 
alleyway, and cut your house up into 6-foot pens. These 
will be 6 by 9 about, outside of hover, and each pen will ac- 
commodate one hundred chickens. Leave one foot only be- 
tween hover and alleyway. You will need a window in each 
department; hang it at bottom so it will open inside. Also 
put some ventilators along north side of house, every ten 
feet. Just fit in a board 3 inches wide 3 feet long, put on 
hinges and let it open inside of house, and you will find these 
ventilators very line in hot weather. You will need a slide 
in every pen in house, so you can move chicks from one end 
of house to the other. You should, use a ten-inch board to 
divide all your pens from this board up you can use wire net' 
ting a foot of one inch nicsh netting first, and from this to 
roof use two-inch mesh. If you breed Leghorns you will need 
to have the house wired to the roof. Of course, you must have 
a gate from alleyway into every pen. A brooder-house like this 
comes in very handy on a free-range plant for raising chicks 
during February and March as you can never get out too many 
early chicks. You will also need several colony houses in yards 
to grow up your young stock in. A little house, 5 by 10. will 
accommodate sixty to seventy-five nicely until they are large 
enough to move to your laying houses, and the oftener you 
can plow these yards and sow with oats the faster your 
chicks will grow. If you have kept them growing without 
a set back your most forward pullets should be laying at four 
months of age. 




POULTRY RAISING 67 

CHAPTER XXIX 

Fireless Brooders, Trick of the Trade, Etc. 

Fireless brooders we read so much about, which are re- 
puted to do such wonderful things, are in my opinion an un- 
certain quantity. I want to say right here that very few, in 
my opinion, ever meet with success who try them. I sent 
$3 to the manufacturer of these brooders to experiment with 
and must confess it was a failure with me. The brooder I 
tell you how to make in another connection at a cost of only 
$2.50 to $3.00, cannot be beaten, at any price, and your chicks 
can remain in them until they can go without heat. You 
vvill also see advertised a trick of the trade which among 
other things helps chicks out of the shell, that is those that 
cannot hatch out or do not pip. My experience is that if 
your eggs are produced under natural conditions and you 
use a good incubator you will have no chicks to pick out of 
the shell. A chick not able to get out without help is of but 
li.ttle value. $1500 from 60 hens in a year is another claim. 
This can only be done by using fancy stock and at the end 
of the year you put a fancy value on all stock on hand value- 
ing your birds from $5 to $50 each, but if you turn these 
birds into cash you will find yourself several hundred dollars 
short. My system described in this book is the greatest lab- 
or saving system known at the present time, many plants in 
various parts of the country are now going up or being oper- 
ated under my system which proves its great superiority 
over any other system known. My sales from 1000 layers 
during 1909 will exceed $5,000 and these sales were eggs sent 
to market, eggs for hatching at $5 per 100, baby chicks at $10 
per 100, cockerels as broilers and hens for breeders at $i each 
which were replaced by me with pullets for my own use. 
No stock at fancy prices is figured in this calculation. And 
all the labor on my plant including the raising of 2,000 young- 
sters was performed by myself and one helper and in addi- 
tion the crops on 60 acre farm were cared for beside including 
5 acres of oats, 3 acres of wheat and 2 acres of potatoes, gath- 
ering of the hay crop, caring for the garden, lawn, etc. So 
you can see the amount of work that can be done with little 
help under my system. 



68 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXX 

Duck Cult (I re 

Believing that this book may fall in the hands of many 
who raise a few ducks, and possibly in the hands of some 
who raise thousands annually, and as I have raised from five 
to ten thousand yearly for many years very successfully, and 
am able to raise nearly every duck hatched that has strength 
enough to eat and drink, I will tell how I do it. The breed- 
ing stock is the foundation of success in the duck business. 
Your breeders in- every case must be young ducks. 

Never keep an old duck over the second year, for they 
will not lay before February, as a rule, while young ducks 
start in December, if properly fed and housed. I prefer 
breeders hatched in April to any other month, as they get 
fully matured early in the fall and are hatched from our 
strongest eggs. 

All breeders should be hatched from April 15 to May 
15. Such ducks should begin to lay in December. 

Your breeding ducks can be kept on very little feed dur- 
ing September and October, but do not let them get too poor, 
for if you do you may loose some. 

If you are on a farm give them range and but little feed. 
A mash of wheat bran and gluten meal, equal parts, makes a 
very cheap feed to summer them on. 

About November i you must begin to feed them heavier 
and house them, if you wish to get early eggs. This is 
where the profit comes in. Give a mash, morning and night 
from November i on as follows : One part bran, on part 
middlings, one part corn meal, one part clover, 5 per cent 
beef scraps, 2 per cent grit and oyster shells. Give all they 
will eat of this night and morning, and keep water by them 
if they do not have a pond. Also give them water in their 
houses at night. A butter tub, sawed down, makes a handy 
thing for this purpose. 

About December i, increase your beef scrap gradually 
from 5 per cent to 10 per cent and lift your ducks occasional- 
ly by the neck and see how they are in flesh. Do not let 
them get too fat to begin to lay in December and in January. 
If they do not gain much, and are thin in flesh, gradually in- 
crease your corn-meal and add some whole corn and whole 
wheat. The more they gain on eggs the heavier feed they 
must have to keep them in good flesh. A good Pekin duck 



POULTRY RAISING 69 

should lay from seventy-five to one hundred eggs without 
stopping. Give plenty of oyster shells and grit. It requires 
great judgment in feeding a flock of ducks to get the most 
eggs and to have them run good and fertile. I have seen 
flocks of breeders knocked out for the whole season by getting 
them too fat before they got to laying good. Your breeders 
for best results should be mated up at the ratio of one drake 
to five ducks. The eggs from such a mating should run fully 
90 per cent fertile from March 20 on, if they do not, as a rule 
you will find your breeders are too fat. 

If you keep ducks for the greatest possible profit you 
will find none to equal the Pekins as layers, and quick grow- 
ers. They stand close confinement, and head the list of mar- 
ket ducks. 

In hatching duck eggs I find a temperature of 102 1-2 
plenty high for good results, and you will get much better 
hatches in warm weather by airing your eggs both morning 
and night. 

When they hatch put them in your brooder and give 
warm water to drink. Watch them closely for t\\'o days and 
teach them to go where the heat is, and after that you wih 
have no further trouble. Give them warm water to drink for 
first two weeks, sure, for cold water will give them cramps, 
which quickly kills them, and if they do not die it will so 
stunt them that they will never get 'over it. 

I have at last found a perfect feed for young ducks when 
first hatched and that is a well known patent chick feed. I pour 
hot water on it, which increases the bulk about one-half; 
when cool, feed and you will find every duck that can be 
raised, or better every duck that has strength to eat, will 
live on this feed, and they grow very rapidly on it too. In 
fact, they could be raised to market size on it, but it would 
not pay as the feed is too high priced; but it pays well to 
start them on it, for they eat but little the first two weeks. 
I would not be without it in raising ducks. 

After the ducklings are two weeks old you can gradual- 
ly change them onto a mash made as follows : One part of 
wheat bran, one part middlings, two parts corn meal, 10 per 
cent, beef scraps, a little grit. They grow very rapidly on this. 
Twenty per cent of green feed can be added with grand re- 
sults. After the seventh week double up your corn-meal and 
increase your beef scraps to 15 per cent and if you have the 
large kind of Pekins they should be ready for market on this 
feed at nine weeks of age, and fully 80 per cent of your flock 
should average five pounds each, dressed weight, many will 
go over this weight. 



70 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

This chick feed will cost you $6 per hunded, and 
even at this price it is the cheapest thing I know of for start- 
ing young ducks, for every one lives on it that is fit to leave 
the incubator. It is the natural duck feed, although not 
generally known. 

In dressing ducks for market hang them in pairs on a 
line, and stick in roof of mouth with a sharp knife, and at the 
same time hit them a solid blow on top of the head, and pull 
out their main tail feathers and wing feathers, except flight 
feathers or plainer feathers on last or outside joint of wing. 
Soon as dead take them down, wash out mouth, and take 
them by the head, two at a time, and dip them in a kettle of 
boiling water until feathers come ofif easy. You will quickly 
learn this with little practice. Have a pail of cold water 
ready to wet your fingers, and take the feathers from the 
breast first, and then turn over and remove the rest, taking 
all large feathers ofif. They are then laid on a shelf for a 
"finisher," who generally gets 3 cents each. The finisher 
cleans them up. Then they go into tubs of cold water and 
later into a barrel of ice water, from which they are packea 
in barrels and heavily iced and shipped to market. 

As soon as your breeders are done laying, about July i, 
they should be sent to market alive. You will never get 
more profit out of them as a rule. 

You can also make* a fine profit selling duck eggs for 
hatching at $8 per hundred. A duck plant surely can make 
a fine profit if handled right, as sickness and lice are not 
known in the duck business. Duck eggs do not hatch nearly 
as well as hen eggs in incubators as a rule, but you have no 
loss after they are hatched if handled right. 

I have carefully experimented with processed oats for 
ducks during 1907, and find this a wonderful feed for yoimg 
ducks. After they are two weeks old give all they will eat 
twice daily, say 10 a. m., also 3 p. m., and you will find them 
the greatest growing feed ever fed to a duck, also greatly re- 
duces the feed bill, and your young will be ready for market 
fully one week sooner They are also a fine feed for old 
ducks, and will greatly increase the egg yield. Give the old 
breeders all they will possibly take noons. And if they do 
not run on grass, give them all the processed oats they 
will eat twice a day, about 11 a. m. and 3 p. m., it will not only 
produce a larger number of eggs, but more fertile. Always 
select your largest, finest ducks for breeders. 

In case your young ducks are in very small yards and 
do not get sufficient exercise, and begin to go back or have 
bowel trouble on the chick feed, then you can mix 



POULTRY RAISING 



71 



bran with it, also stale bread, soaked in water, say equal parts 
of each, and feed every other feeding on this until you change 
their feed, after two weeks of age, and you should have no 
further trouble. You must remember one thing that in go- 
ing in the duck business it means lots of hard work and 
is no business for a lazy man. But if you live near a good- 
sized city and can work up a good, private trade for your 
young ducks among private families, markets, and hotels, 
and not have to depend on the commission man, you will 
find a fine profit in ducks. 





TYPICAL HEADS OF MALE AND FEMALE WHITE WYANDOTTES 



72 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

CHAPTER XXXI 

Summary. 

All oats will not grow satisfactorily, and if you get some 
that will not nearly all grow, try another lot of another deal- 
er, for when they grow satisfactory you will have a complete 
mass of roots and sprouts, which should be i to i 1-2 inches 
long. 



Have several larg- lots of oats growing for a large plant 
and do not get out of them, for this is your main feed for 
producing eggs and g'-owing chicks. There is nothing like 
it. Give them all thev will eat twice each day, as they will 
live and grow on this as they will on nothing else. It forms 
fully 60 per cent of their rations after they are a week old. 



If you fail to make the success you expect under this 
system, write me, enclosing stamp, and I will straighten you 
out, for you cannot go wrong if you follow my instructions 
to the letter. 



If your little chicks are on board floors you should clean 
their pens out every four days sure, and put the leavings in 
runs of your old hens. They will clean up all the seeds and 
oats not eaten by chicks. Cover your floor lightly with clo- 
ver. There is nothing as good. 



Your Leghorn pullets should lay at five months of age, if 
you have fed and cared for them as laid down in this book. If 
they do not, you have failed to carry out some important part, 
or your stock is not the laying kind. 



A poor memory is a bad thing for a poultry man, and 
will put you out of business. By all means put your memory 
in your business. Nothing can be neglected or forgotten if 
you wish certain success. 



Trap and poison all rats during the fall and early winter, 
for you cannot raise rats and chicks on the same plant. 



POULTRY RAISING 73 

Hopper feed only wheat, such as a good grade of 
screening or a cheap grade of wheat. Do not hopper feed 
grain of any other kind and then wonder why you are not get- 
ting results. 



Remember you cannot get a hen laying in a day or two. 
It takes from two to five w-eeks, depending on the condition 
of the hen and the time of the year. So, for big results, do 
not neglect your hen and let her stop laying. 



Do not neglect your houses and let them get full of 
mites and lice. Go over your roosts at least once a month 
during summer with crude oil and carbolic acid, half and 
half — or a good lice exterminator. Also clean droppings 
from board floors once a week sure at all times of the 
year, for lice multiply very rapidly in droppings in the sum- 
mer time on board floors. On the ground it is dififerent. 



In order to get the greatest egg-yield always add some 
salt to your processed oats daily the year around, not less 
than a teaspoonful to a ten-quart pailful of feed, for the 
greater amount of water a hen drinks the more eggs she will 
lay. 



In hot weather keep your oats well wet down with cold 
water so they will not spoil ; wet thern thoroughly twice daily 
if necessary. Never wet them before feeding. Any common 
feeding oats will grow just as fast as high priced and if you 
want them at any time for green feed only, let sprouts get i 1-2 
to 2 inches long. But remember they have more feeding value 
and are the greatest egg-producers when sprouts are i to 
I 1-2 inches long. Give your young chicks all they will 
eat twice a day sure. Also remember they are a great feed 
for young ducks and will grow them very rapidly and increase 
their size. Do not be afraid to give them all they will eat 
twice daily. 



While I find a good grade of wheat screenings 
far ahead of any other feed for hopper feeding, I also find it 
very hard to obtain and at times I am compelled to feed 
wheat. If you cannot get good screenings by all means use 
a cheap grade of wheat. Red wheat is better than white 
wheat. 



74 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



I want to impress on you the importance of a free-range 
plant, for you cannot fail if you build one of my free-range 
systems and handle it accordingly. I know of no business that 
will make you money faster, all things considered, than the 
poultry business if handled properly. And I know of no busi- 
ness where money can be lost faster all things considered than 
in the poultry business. I have taken plants that have had to 
go out of business and started them in again under my free- 
range system with Leghorns, and they have made money very 
rapidly on same plant, where under the old system they lost 
everything. So you can see it is the proper feed and care that 
makes success certain. 



i 



If many of your little chicks die during first two weeks you 
will find your trouble is with your breeders almost every 
time. To all who follow my free-range system success is 
certain. If your chicks are closely confined in small yards and 
begin to die and dwindle away at three to four weeks of age, 
you must begin to feed them green cut bone when three weeks 
old sure. Give a liberal feeding every noon. 



Spade yards up and sow with oats as often as you can un- 
til you get them on more range. I am always ready to give 
advice and help all I can, time permitting. 




THE BRIGGS' 

SECRETS IN POULTRY 
CULTURE 



SUPPLEMENT TO 

FOURTH EDITION 

"PROFITS IN POULTRY 

KEEPING SOLVED" 



BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION. 

I am giving on the few pages following some valuable 
poultry secrets as discovered in my 20 years of careful experi- 
menting in the poultry world, secrets of value that have never 
been published before. Poultry Secrets without a system to 
know when and where and how to use them is like owning a 
steam engine and not knowing how to run it. By using these 
secrets in connection with the methods set forth in the preced- 
ing pages of this book, you cannot fail to succeed. 

EDWARD BRIGGS. 



76 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

Secret of Success Is Handling Early Chicks. 

Under this heading I want to say that the great secret 
of success is hatching chicks in March and April. If every 
one in this country would hatch out all their chicks about 
April 1st, we would not read of so many failures, for at this 
time chicks are easily raised and if given half a chance, one 
can raise nearly every chick hatched. 

There are many advantages in hatching chicks all out at 
nearly one time. The amount of labor saved during the 
season is a wonderful item for when the chicks get to one and 
and and a half pounds they can be watered in open vessels, 
hopper fed and are all at roost, saving the labor of caring for 
brooders, all this labor is gone through and over at one time. 

Also the labor of caring for incubators is out of the way 
and you can arrange things so you can go away for a day or 
two and the chicks can take care of themselves. So I want to 
emphasize here for sure success and a saving of labor during 
the season, hatch all chicks out early and all as nearly at one 
time as possible. 

The pullets will be laying September and will pay a profit 
right through the Winter and will make the very best of 
breeders for the following season. Failures are not known 
where the chicks are all hatched early, for the cockerels are 
marketed as two pound broilers at a good price, generally for 
enough to mature the pullets on, so one is not out for feed 
and a profit is practically secured from tlie start. 

Secret of Raising Late Hatched Chickens. 

As a rule the raising of late chickens is what puts many 
poultry plants out of business. 

Chicks hatched in May, June, and July have not the vi- 
tality to start with that the March and April chicks have and 
with the hot weather coming on to weaken them, at two or 
three weeks old they begin to droop and die very rapidly as 
bowel trouble takes hold of them at this time, (known as 
white diarrhoea) and the result is they often die just as fast 
as you can hatch them, and the few that pull through grow 
so slow and are so puny that they never amount to much 
and are worthless as breeders. 

I will give a feeding formula that will raise nearly every 
chick hatched in May, June and July, and carry them right 
through the critical age of from two to five weeks old, and 
keep them growing. 



78 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

First, spray brooder thoroughly with Crel OH, sold at 
nearly all feed stores at $i.oo per quart. After spraying cover 
bottom of brooder with half inch of wheat bran, put on hov- 
er and put your chicks in. Set a small box of my dry mash 
in near them I use a cigar box for this purpose for first two 
weeks, then use a larger one and nail a lath around edge so 
they cannot scratch the feed out. Keep this dry mash be- 
fore them at all times. Secret of formula for making found in 
this book. Also feed three times a day a light feeding 
of Patent Chick Feed, or some other of good quality, the 
less cracked corn in it the better. The best chick grain con- 
tains no cracked corn, also give grit, and good clean water. 
And every morning give a quart of sweet milk right from the 
cow to every loo chicks, if you keep a cow ; if not, it will pay 
you to buy the milk, as this is most important as on this one 
thing hangs the secret of success. Give them milk just as 
long as you can and you will fairly see them grow, and you 
will be able to mature them fully two months sooner than in 
any other way. Give all the processed oats they will take 
every noon, and if you can give them free range so much the 
better; put them under my cultivated svstem and the raising 
of late chicks will become both a pleasure and very profitable. 

I have spent many years and hundreds of dollars in ex- 
perimenting with late hatched chicks to find a way to raise 
them successfully and at a profit and now I am rewarded. 
The secret alone is worth the price of my book many times 
over. 

Secret of a Large Egg Yield. 

The secret of a profitable egg yield is keeping your hens 
laying the year round, or getting a large egg yield during the 
summer months of June, July, August and September, and 
this can only be done under my free-range cultivated system 
of harrowing the ground every other day sure, with a spring 
tooth harrow and sow liberally with oats. As the season ad- 
vances in August and September add some corn, say three- 
quarters oats and oiie-quarter corn, and if you can give sour 
milk to drink, they will pay you a grand profit the entire sea- 
son in eggs. 

Old hens will not lay many eggs in October, November 
and December, no matter what you feed, so it is best to give 
them a rest at this time, and not try to force them. Do not 
neglect the processed oats at any time of the year. They 
should have one good feed daily all summer even on free 
range with ground harrowed every other day or daily. The 
ground should be plowed once a month sure. 



POULTRY RAISING. 



79 



Secret of Feeding Unthrashed Grain in Winter. 

I believe, as far as I know, I am the first and only one 
who has advocated this and parties w^ho have followed my 
methods have received an exceptional egg yield during the 
Winter and the fertility of the eggs has run exceptionallv 
high and given wonderful hatches. To flocks of 60 to 75 
birds, I give in the morning a good sized sheaf of oats; at 
noon a good-sized sheaf of wheat, and at night a feeding of 







FIRST PRIZe Boston 190fc "%«»-" t<»^ »• 
ftPSI PRUe- BOTTOM igo"ilASCKL) •C~i~ 



A HIGH CLASS S. C. WHITE LEGHORN COCK THAT WON AT SEVERAL 
OF THE LARGEST SHOWS 



8o BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

corn, which may be fed on the ear, giving it to them in the af- 
ternoons. Mornings I give a good feeding of processed oats, 
all they will eat with special Egg Maker fed according 
to directions. I keep before them all the time my dry mash 
for producing eggs, as found in this book, I also keep be- 
fore them grit, charcoal and oyster shells, also beef scraps, in 
case you do not use a special Egg Maker. This method is only 
available on farms, but it is the cheapest method known and 
the greatest egg producer, nearest to nature of any system 
in the world. 

Secret of Getting Eggs Every Month in the Year. 

At no time in the whole year are eggs so scarce as during 
October, November and December, and for profit in market 
eggs you will never find a time when fresh eggs are sought 
after more than at this time. Buyers are always ready to 
give a premium on fresh eggs at this time of year. 

Now, the great question is how to get a large egg yield 
these three months. I want to say right here, a large egg 
yield at this time is hard to get, for all old hens are in molt- 
and can be depended on for but a few eggs. A hen can 
be kept laying until she drops nearly all her feathers, and then, 
when she gets her new coat nearly all on she is used up and is 
bound to take a two month's rest. So the only way to keep the 
egg yield up at this time is with February and March pullets 
grown to full maturity before they are allowed to lay, for if 
they lay too young their eggs are very small and unmarket- 
able. When your pullets are fully matured and ready to lay, 
or better just started, then move them to their laying houses 
which may stop their laying for a short time ; if so it will be 
much better for when they start again their eggs will be much 
larger c^nd can then be maketed for regular size eggs. 

Now you may wonder why pullets will not lay as well at 
this time as in Spirng. I will tell you why. A chicken is 
like a tree, they require the Spring sun to do their best. A 
tree drops its leaves from October on, whether we have any 
frost or not and lies dormant until the sun begins to travel 
North again and puts life in it. A hen in her natural state 
is just the same and if we expect eggs in abundance during 
these three months it requires the very best of care and feed 
and good judgment. Sour or lopper milk is a great help at 
this time. Cultivate your ground all good days and sow plen- 
ty of grain and on bad days give grain in the sheaf; do every- 
thing possible to keep them busy, and your egg yield will re- 
pay you for your trouble. 



POULTRY RAISING. 



8i 



Secret of Curing White Diarrhoea. 

Of all the diseases that ever struck little chicks, White 
Diarrhoea is the worst and has probably killed more little 
chicks than all the other diseases put together. .It will take 
whole broods off in a few days, and the further the season 
advances the more fatal it gets. I have known plants that 
had none of it in their early hatches, and in their late hatches 
whole broods would go with it. After years of careful exper- 
imenting, I am satisfied it is a germ disease and the treatment 




15?7 









A BARRED PLYMOUTH ROCK MALE SHOWING FINE SHAPE 
AM) BARRING 



82 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

should be started with the old stock. I find chicks bred from 
old breeders on free cultivated range, as my book describes, 
rarely ever have anyof this bowel trouble. Now as a posi- 
tive preventative, spray your houses once every two weeks 
with Crel Oil. Spray your brooders before you put your 
chicks in and after you spray it cover bottom with quarter 
inch of wheat bran and put your chicks right in and feed as 
I laid down in the Secret of Feeding Late Hatched Chicks, by 
giving sweet milk to drink, and I am sure you will see no 
trace of this trouble. In case you see any cases spray your 
brooder once a week with Crell Oil and put one-third of a 
teaspoonful of Humphrey's Specific J. K. to a quart of water ; 
this J. K. can be bought at any drug store at 50c a bottle. 
Follow these directions closely and I am sure you will have 
no further trouble with this disease. Spray your roosts once 
a month sure all summer with this for both old and young- 
stock. 

Secret of Curing Gapes. 

Gapes carries away thousands of chicks every year, special- 
ly among the farmers and to catch each chick and take the 
worms out is a tedious undertaking and then you injure many 
chicks besides the large number you kill and the large number 
you let die through neglect in taking them in time. If you will 
spray your coops with Crel Oil before putting your chicks in 
and when a week old, if they show any trace of it, spray coops 
again at night just before they go to roost; this will prevent 
it, but if any show gapes after this just take them all and put 
them in a box that has just had the bottom sprayed with it, 
cover with an old bag and all the worms in windpipe will 
quickly be killed. Every one that has followed my directions 
has cured their chicks and not lost one. 

Secret Formula for Making the Cheapest and Best Lice 
Powder Known. 

The lice powder I am going to tell you how to make may 
be made at 8 to 9 cents a pound, and is far superior to the 
powders sold on the market at 25 cents per pound, and will 
not only kill all the lice it comes in contact with, but will re- 
main on the hen for two or three days. Buy at your drug 
store one pound Persian Insect Powder and from your feed 
store three pounds Red Dog Flour, usually one and one-half 
cents a pound, or the best white middlings ; mix this thor- 
oughly and you have four pounds of the best insect powder 
known. The Persian Insect Powder usually costs thirty 
cents a pound. 



POULTRY RAISING. 



83 



Secret of Making the Best Liquid Lice Killer. 
This lice killer I consider far superior to any now sold 
on the market at any price and can be bought at almost any 
drug- store, at a cost of about 50 cents per gallon. Take a 
gallon can to your druggist and have him put in it half crude 
carbolic acid and half crude oil ; shake this up well and you 
have one of the best lice paints that can be made. Just spray 
your houses once a month with this and you will never be 
troubled with lice. 







't^. 



A BARRED PLYMOUTH ROCK HEN REPRESENTING A FINE TYPE OF 
THIS POPULAR BREED 



84 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

Secret of Raising Turkeys. 

This secret will be more than valuable to those who try to 
raise a large number of turkeys yearly, and have met with se- 
vere losses, for it is now generally conceded that turkeys are 
the hardest to raise of any of the feathered tribe. They may 
look fine today and be dead tomorrow. I have been careful- 
ly experimenting to perfect a system with which I could raise 
nearly eveiy turkey hatched and I have yet to lose the first 
one that was perfectly hatched. When I take the young ones 
from the nest I first put them in a small box that has been 
sprayed with Crel Oil. I then put a loose bag over them and 
leave them 5 minutes so they will breathe this thoroughly to 
kill all germs. This should be done once a week for 5 weeks 
as I find the greatest loss comes from a germ disease and 
when you kill the germ you can raise turkeys and in no other 
way. Turkeys two years old make the best breeders as their 
young are much stronger. I shut the old turkey in a coop 
of good size for first two weeks with chicks and feed them 
principally on a special Patent Chick grain and cracked corn 
cooked A curd made from loppered milk is also very good. 
I give I hem sweet milk to drink right from the cow. A foun- 
tain of milk and one of water. They have this every morn- 
ing and are fed lightly three times daily. After two weeks old 
I put three drops of Spirits of Camphor to a quart of water 
and if at any time I see any of them droop I increase the cam- 
phor to five drops to a quart of water. This braces them 
right up and carries them safely through the critical period. 
It is a pleasure to see them grow. The sweet milk just 
pushes them right through. After five weeks of age they can 
be put on good wheat screenings and cracked corn dry and 
will thrive fine if given plenty of range. A cow pasture 
makes an ideal range for turkeys. In the early fall put them 
on whole corn and good wheat. You will find more pro- 
fit in a flock of turkeys than anything you raise on your farm. 
Just try this method and I am sure you will have no further 
trouble in raising turkeys. 

Briggs' Secret Dry Mash for Baby Chicks. 

The dry mash I am going to tell you how to make, has 
proven for me to be the greatest dry mash for growing chicks 
from shell to maturity of any mixture I have ever been able 
to secure and I consider it the nearest perfect of any mash 
ever compounded. 

Take by weight 100 lbs. wheat bran. 100 lbs. middlings, 
100 lbs. corn meal, 100 lbs. gluten meal, mix thoroughly and 



POULTRY RAISING. 



85 



keep before them at all times. Also keep before them grit and 
beef scraps. 




A FAMOUS PEN OF PRIZE WINNING S. C. WHITE LEGHORNS 

Briggs' Secret Dry Mash for Laying Fowls. 
Take equal parts by weight of wheat bran, white mid- 
dlings, corn meal, gluten meal and ground oats ; mix thorough- 
ly and keep before them in hoppers. Feed some grain by 
hand and the results will surprise you. 

Secret Egg Preserving Formula. 
Purchase from your druggist as much Silicate of Soda as 
you may wish. Mix in with cold water in the proportion of 
six parts of water to one of Silicate of Soda. Use newly laid 



86 BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 

eggs not more than one week old. Dip each egg separately 
in the solution, and place it in a vessel large part down ; then 
pour over the eggs enough of the solution to entirely immerse 
them. Do not fail to dip each egg separately before placing 
in the vessel, and hold the egg in your hand for two or three 
seconds after you have dipped it, that the coating may set, 
and place in the vessel as directed. Cover the vessel up and 
the next day or the next week, as the case may l)e. when }()u 
wish to add more eggs, repeat the operation of dipping, set 
the eggs in on top of those already in the vessel as directed. 
Cover the vessel up and for the next day or the next week, as 
the case may be, when you wish to add more eggs, repeat the 
operation of dipping, set the eggs in on top of those already in 
the vessel and cover again with the solution. You will find 
the air has been entirely excluded from the shell, and the eggs 
have been hermetically sealed and will stay fresh indefinitely 
if you have properly handled them. 

Secret of Breeding for Layers. 
After two years careful experimenting on my new plant 
and from careful obeservation from other plants, I have come 
to the conclusion that it does not pay to trap nest to produce 
a strain of prolific layers, in fact, every large plant that has 
tried it as a rule has given it up or has been compelled to sell 
out in 2 or 3 years. Exceptions to this rule are very scarce. The 
amount of labor that it requires to run a plant with trap nests 
will quickly put it out of business. The greatest success to- 
day comes from the system where but little labor is required 
and my system stands alone in this respect. You may not 
know that the Maine Experiment Station made a careful test 
for ten years with trap nests using all the different nests 
known, for money was no object and after breeding from 
their greatest layers for ten years by the use of the trap nest 
'their average per hen was over 30 eggs less per hen than when 
they started. This I am sure is a great surprise to the poultry 
world and proves beyond a doubt that it does not pay to trap 
nest birds. To breed up a strain of heavy layers without 
extra labor, take each year about half of your pullets, those 
that mature the quickest and start to lay ahead of the rest, 
and flock them by themselves and band them so they will be 
known from others, for they are bound to make your best 
layers. Mate these with your earliest maturing cockerels 
and continue to do this year after year, using the selected 
pullets two years for breeds. In this way you not only get 
a phenominal flock of layers but your birds will increase 
in size and vigor and sickness will rarely be known 



POULTRY RAISING 



87 



among them. Slow maturing birds are much more subject 
to disease, and never prove great layers while the quick ma- 
turing kind do. You will find this system of picking out the 
layers far ahead of any system now in use and the only system 
in my estimation that will ever prove a success. 




A POPULAR MEMBER OF THE WYANDOTTE FAMILY 



POULTRY RAISING 89 

Secret of Telling the Laying Hen. 

This secret is often valuable during the early fall when 
hens are slacking off fast on egg yield, and you might wish to 
market a part of the flock that are through laying or might 
want to kill a pair for dinner and certainly would not want 
to kill the layers. You may always know that as a rule a hen 
with a bright red comb is a laying hen so do not kill these 
kind. Rather kill the lazy looking hens, those with pale 
combs. After catching them up notice if you can lay three 
fingers between the pelvic bones which are just below the 
vent. In old hens you can lay 3 fingers between these bones 
if they are laying. Leghorns often lay when only two fingers 
can be laid between the bones. The egg passes between these 
bones in being deposited. If the bones are close together and 
stiff you may safely conclude that the hen is not laying and 
will not lay for several weeks as a rule. I understand this 
is the same system as is used by several others although I 
have never seen their system. 

Secret of Fattening Poultry. 

If for broilers take chicks that are about i 1-2 lbs. each 
in weight, and put them in flocks of about fifty. If they have 
had free range so much the better. If they have a good large 
house they will need no yard. One of my 10 by 20 houses 
is just right for 50 to 75 chicks. I advise feeding them two 
weeks before kilhng. Mix up dry six parts corn meal, two parts 
middlings, one part gluten meal, one part Unseed meal, and one 
and one-half parts beef scraps and add 5 per cent grit; mix 
thoroughly dry and before feeding mix with milk either sweet 
or sour or with water and give them all they will eat twice 
daily. Keep before them all the time, six parts corn meal and 
two parts beef scraps mixed dry, keep this in a box so they can 
have free access to it at all times and in two weeks they 
should be as fat as squabs and weigh two lbs. and over each. 

Secret of Breaking Up Broody Hens Quickly 

The great secret of breaking up broody hens quickly is 
to shut up a number together, a dozen or more. Put them 
in a coop right on the ground with a wire netting front and 
they will not think of setting, where one hen is alone in such a 
coop a persistent setter will scratch a nest at one end and go 
to setting. If you take every setter off the nest the very night 
they start to set you can as a rule break them up in three 
days. Always keep water before them but give but Httle 
feed while they are shut up. In case you shut up your 
broody hens only once a week and want to break them up 



90 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 



quickly put them in a small pen. Arrange one or two roosts 
depending upon how many hens you shut up and put with 
them a good vigorous cockerel. If you have a male bird, 
sickly or not doing well put him in this same pen and you will 
be surprised to see how quickly he w411 get well and your set- 
ting hens will all be on the perches. This soon will break 
up the most persistent setters in three or four days. 

Secret of Molting Fowls Early, 

It is a question yet unsolved whether it pays to have hens 
molt early or keep them laying as long as possible and let 
them molt rather late. I am satisfied after experimenting 
carefully along these lines that it pays to keep the hens lay- 
ing just as long as possible and do their molting during Oc- 
tober and November, so as to get them laying again in De- 
cember or January. A good hen will lay all through the 
molt but when she is finishing her coat she will stop in near- 



--Vi^^^-C* 




I ST pi I' NW i * i"»-'i.h 







A TRIO OF SINGLE COMB WHITE LEGHORNS THAT HAS WON AT LEADING SHOWS 



\ 



POULTRY RAISING 91 

ly every case and have a rest. Nothing will molt them so 
fast as processed oats and beef scraps. To have them molt 
in June 'and July just take away all grain and give all pro- 
cessed oats keeping beef scraps before them all the tirne 
and they will surprise you in the short time they will be in 
getting a new coat of feathers. Try this for birds you wish 
to exhibit at Fall shows. A bird in new plumage always does 
the winning. 

Secret of Preparing White Birds for Exhibition. 
To prepare white birds for exhibition and have them 
white as snow with that glossy finish, is an art that few pos- 
.sess. In our large shows where judges have gone color crazy 
it is no longer an easy matter to win a prize. In washing 
white birds'! use four tubs of water. In first tub of warm 
w^ater I shave half a cake of Ivory soap and make a good suds, 
then I use half a cake of soap, a good hand brush and I soak 
the- bird thoroughly and rub plenty of soap into the feathers 
and give her a thorough scrubbing ; then put her in next tub of 
clean warm water and wash her thoroughly, getting all soap 
out of the feathers, then I put her in the third tub of warm 
water. In this tub of water I put a small amount of blueing 
and wash all traces of soap out of her ; she then goes in a fourth 
tub of cold water nicely blued but not enough to color the 
feathers, rinsing her thoroughly and then I put her in a clean 
cage to dry where the tempera'ture is about 80 degrees, using 
plenty of clean straw in bottom, the cage being provided 
with wire netting bottom. Wash the feet and legs thorough- 
ly and pick off 'all old scales. In washing white birds you 
should remove all colored feathers as they show plainly when 
wet. Aiter your birds are dry and do not come oat chalk 
wdiite nave on hand some peroxide of hydrogen and take a 
sponge and go over them with this bsing careful to get none 
on legs. This will put them in pink of condition. After this 
put some vaseline on their legs rubbing them well with it. If 
you have done your work thoroughly your bird will be in fit 
condition to go into any show and win the blue ribbon if it 
has the natural quality. Ycu should tame your birds so they 
will be very gentle and pose nicely for the judge. A bird must 
be trained to show its shape if you expect to win in strong 
competition. 

The Secret of Feeding Salt. 

It is not generally known to the poultry woild that salt 
is the greatest conditioner and the greatest egg producer 



92 



BRIGGS' SYSTEM OF 




A WELL BRED S. C. WHITE LEGHORN COCK 

known to the poultry world. Poultry will be in much better 
condition and lay fully 25 per cent more eggs per year per 
hen if fed a reasonable amount of salt the year around and 
the whole flock will be in much finer condition for it. 

I am satisfied after a series of careful experimenting that 
the only perfect way to feed it is by mixing it with processed 
oats or barley whichever you process. An ounce to 100 hens 
is about right or a small handful to a large pail of feed. 
Fowls are just crazy all the time for the processed oats which 
have been salted as directed. I discontinued salt on one lot 
of layers during July and started it again in August and 
doubled the egg yield in 15 days from the time I started us- 
ing it again. Young chicks will grow much faster and keep 
much more healthy if fed processed oats salted same as for 
laying hens. The loss should be nothing to speak of and 
birds will mature and lay fully a month sooner. If you want 
to obtain the greatest profit from your poultry plant do not 
fail to use salt the year around as directed. 



I 



POULTRY RAISING 93 

RESULTS : 

Among the thousands who have bought my book I find 
there are a few who want results of my plant in figures. On 
account of selling part of my breeders every season begin- 
ning in August, for this reason it is impossible to give results 
on my plant for one year, but to show you what can be done 
with looo layers in seven months, starting January i, I have 
carefully gone over my books and am giving you results in 
sales of eggs and baby chicks only for seven months for the 
reason that Poultry Success has been advertising $3500 in 
seven months from 1000 layers. When I gave them these fig- 
ures I had no idea my sales were about $4,000, had I taken 
sales of stock and broilers in my estimate which I did not. 
First I will give you sales of eggs for each month for ssven 
months beginning January i, and will give you a separate ac- 
count of baby cWcks sold monthly. This will give you some 
idea what can be done by anyone who will follow my System 
and do a liberal amount of advertising for you cannot sell 
hundreds and thousands of dollars' worth of eggs for hatchmg 
and baby chicks if you do not advertise and advertise liberal- 
ly. In giving the sales of eggs and baby chicks for seven 
months I want to say 100 Leghorn hens were sold May loth 
for $135.00. So from May loth on I had only 900 layers in my 
estimate. I will first give you my sale of eggs by months: 
January, $123.50; February, $271.84; March, $385-18; April, 
$740.82; May, $406.96; June $182.64; July $201.36; or a total of 
$2312.30 worth of eggs in seven months from lOOO layers. Now 
remember this is independent of the eggs used for hatching 
2,000 young chicks for my own plant. The baby 
chicks sold as follows: March, $186.40; April, $343; May, 
$459.93; June, $197.50; July, $79, or a total of $1,265.83 for 
baby chicks for first seven months and all Leghorn baby 
chicks were sold at $10.00 per 100 and the average hatches 
were 300 to 330 chicks from 400 eggs set, which proves that 
my eggs run as fertile as I claim and give phenomenal hatches 
of chicks that are so large and strong that they are easily 
raised with but little care. In closing I want to say what I 
have done I believe can easily be done by anyone who will put 
up one of my free-range plants and follow my Systemas laid 
down in this book and do a liberal amount of advertising, I 
want to say that the total sales from 1,000 layers at end of year 
will exceed $5,000. So you must know that there is a fair 
amount of profit left such as but few other kinds of business 
can return. 



INDEX OF SUBJECTS 



A. 

A combination plant 60 

A Leghorn plant for profit 

54, 55, 56 

An egg plant for proft. .25, 26 
A perfect brooder. . . 44, 45, 46 
A system for large breeds 

59, 63, 64 

A White Wyandotte plant 

for profit 57, 58, 59 

A yarded plant, how to 

erect 65, 66 

B. 

Bees 60 

Bowel trouble, cause and 

cure 48 

Breeders, loss of 61 

Breeding for Layers ... 86, 8 7 
Brigg's dry mash for baby 

chicks 8 4 

Brigg's dry mash for laying 

fowls 85 

Brigg's poultry plant ... .7, s 

Broilers, how to raise.. 48, 49 

Brooder, a perfect . .44, 45 46 

Brooder, fireless 67 

Broody hens, how to break 

89, 90 

C. 

("are of laying hens on free 

range 22 

Caring for a yarded plant 

35, 36 

Changing breeding stock 

33, 34, 43 

Chicks, helping out of shell 67 
Chicks, how to feed. . . .41, 42 
Chicks raised Nature's way 

40, 41, 42, 43 

Colds and roup 50 

Colony, size of IL 

Construction of model lay- 
ing house 15, 16, 17 

D. 

Desirable size of plant 11 

Dry mash for baby chicks 

84, 85 

Dry mash for laying fowls. . 85 
Duck culture. . . . 68, 69, 70, 71 

E. 

Early chicks 76 



Eggs every month in the 

year 80 

Egg preserving formula. 85, 86 

F. 

Fattening poultry, how to 

do it 89 

Feed for young ducks 69 

Feed hoppers 21 

Feed processed ....28, 29, 30 
Feeding and selection of 

large breeds 63, 64 

Feeding chicks 41, 42 

Feeding.salt 91, 92 

Feeding system when wheat 

and oats can not be used. 57 
Feeding unthrashed grain 

79, 80 

Fences 11 

Fireless brooder 67 

Free range plant with least 

labor 33, 34, 74 

Fruit, poultry and bees. ... 60 

G. 

Gapes, secret of curing and 
how to prevent 82 

H. 

Hatch, when to. . .' 76 

Helping chicks out of shell. 67 
Hen in wild or natural state 

10 

Hoppers for feed 21 

House, incubator 37 

House, model laying house 

plan 13 

House, construction of 

model laying 15, 16, 17 

How to colonize or flock 

hens 12 

How to keep green feed all 

summer in a yarded plant 35 
How to make best lice pow- 
der 8- 

How to make best liquid 

lice killer 83 

How to start in the poultry 

business 52.53 

How to tell the laying hen. 89 

I. 

Incubator house, how to 

build 37 

Incubator, how to run. .38, 3 9 



Late hatched chicks. . . .76, 78 
Laying nens, care of on 

range 22 

Laying hens, how to tell . . 89 
Laying house. . . .13, 15, 16, 17 

Laying out a plant 12 

Leghorn plant for profit 

54, 55, 56 

Lice powder, how to make. 82 
Liquid lice killer ,how to 

make 83 

Location of plant 11 

Loss of breeders 61 

M. 

Mating breeders 55 

Molting 62, 90, 91 

Molting fowls early, how to 
do it 9 0, 91 



N. 



Nets 



17 



O. 



Dats, sprouted 28, 29, 30 

Oats, sowing for flock. ... 31 



P. 



13 



Plan of model laying house. 
Preparing white fowls for 

exhibition .91 

Processed oats, feeding. . . . 

22, 25, 26, 31, 32 

Processed oats, how to make 

28, 29, 30 

R. 

Raising broilers 48, 49 

Raising chicks Nature's way 

40, 41, 42, 

Raising late hatched chicks 

76, 

Roasters 49 

Roup bx. 

Results, financial 9 3 



43 

78 



Salt, feeding 91, 92 

Secret of breeding for lay- 
ers 86, 87 

Secret of breaking up 
broody hens quickly. .8 9. 9 

Secret of curing gapes. ... 82 



Secret of curing white diar- 
rhoea 81, 82 

Secret of fattening poultry 89 
Secret of feeding salt.. 91, 92 
Secret of feeding unthrash- 

ed grain 79, 80 

Secret of getting eggs every 

month in the year 80 

Secret of large egg yield. . . .78 
Secret of making best and 

cheapest lice powder. ... 82 
Secret of making best liquid 

lice killer 83 

Secret of molting fowls 

early 90, 91 

Secret of preparing white 

fowls for exhibition 91 

Secret of preserving eggs. 

85, 86 

Secret of raising turkeys. . 84 
Secret of raising late hatch- 
ed chicks 76, 78 

Secret of success 76 

Secret of telling the laying 

hen 89 

Selection and feeding of 

large breeds 63, 64 

Size of colony or flock. ... 12 

Slope of land 11 

Soil 11 

Specifications of model lay- 
ing house 13 

Si)routed oats 28, 29, 30 

Starting in the poultry busi- 
ness, when and how. .52, 53 
Summer care of flocks. .31, 3 2 

T. 

Turkeys, secret of raising. 84 

W. 

Water supply by streams or 

springs 11 

Watering in winter . . . .25, 26 
White diarrhoea ... .48, 81, 82 
White fowls, how to prepare 

for exhibition 91 

White Wyandotte plant for 

profit 57, 58, 59 

Winter care of layers. . .25, 26 

Y. 

Yarded plant, caring for. 35, 3 6 
Yarded plant, how to erect 
65, 66 



IAN 19 m- 



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